CHANDIGARH, Nov 24: Taking a serious note of the violations of norms by the Rotary District 3090 in Patiala, Rotary International has debarred the district from participating in the Group Study Exchange Programme (GSE) for one year. A communication making District 3090 ineligible for participating in the GSE programme for 1998-99 Rotary year was sent by chairman of the Rotary Foundation Trustees Robert R. Berth, earlier this month, after reviewing the documentation concerning the District GSE team's travel to Brazil in 1997-98.The Rotary Foundation trustees have taken a serious note of the travel of Vishwajeet Khanna (who is at present Deputy Commissioner Patiala) and his wife Sukhvinder Khanna (Kaur), as part of the same team in the 1997-98 GSE Programme of Rotary International, even though the two were married. Under the Rotary norms no two members of a GSE team, who are married can travel in the same team. The two had earlier given a statement which confirmed that team members were not married to the other member of the same team. The two had gone to District 4520 (Brazil).Their applications had also been signed by two different club presidents and club secretaries, by the GSE chairman Dr Naveen Saronwala as well as by the Rotary District Governor P.D. Bansal. In fact, Saronwala also signed the application as president who recommended Sukhvinder Kaur.Khanna, when contacted, said that they had mentioned the names of each other's spouse on the applications, which were filled for separate teams. "Since we were not fully aware of the Rotary norms, it was up to the Rotary leadership to ascertain about the violations", he said, adding that "it was up to the discretion of the Rotary to drop either of us." With regard to the declaration, he said, it was a printed line, which would have got overlooked since the documents were signed by Rotary leaders. The Rotary Foundation also noted that the 1997-98 GSE Selection Committee did not include the immediate past district governor or the current district governor, who was the district governor nominee at the time.A GSE selection Committee is required to include both, besides the district governor at the time, along with a minimum of three other Rotarians. The trustees further noted that ``it is difficult to understand how a GSE Selection Committee could without bias select its own chairman to serve as the GSE team leader.'' Since the trustees relied on the district leadership, they held that ``the serious nature of violations cannot be dismissed''.
