Kerala: India's first Islamic bank gets RBI approval

Bengaluru, Feb 24: Census authorities in Karnataka have requested deputy commissioners in the state’s districts to hold outreach and awareness campaigns about the National Population Register (NPR), as they fear misgivings about the exercise could hurt the forthcoming enumeration of population.

The house-listing phase of the Census and updating of NPR will be rolled out simultaneously by mid-April in the BJP-ruled state.

About 1,50,000 enumerators will handle the massive exercise.

Officials believe widespread awareness will help address concerns about the NPR data-gathering process and make people cooperate with enumerators when they visit houses for both NPR and census work.

“Sensing the kind of questions that enumerators may face when they do house visits, in all video conferences with deputy commissioners of districts, we have requested to establish contact with local representatives,” SB Vijay Kumar, director of Census Operations in Karnataka told news agency. “We have asked them to organise outreach programmes to ensure that people’s doubts are resolved before the information gathering work begins,” he added.

Census operations are handled by the Union home ministry. Several district officials are said to have raised concerns about the possibility of people refusing to share information when the work on the census and NPR begins in two months. This would affect the quality of the census work, making the exercise incomplete.

news channel earlier reported that people in parts of Karnataka had declined to share personal information with officials visiting households in connection with government programmes, suspecting them of gathering data for the yet-to-be unveiled National Register of Citizens, following enactment of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) recently.

Kumar said district authorities will train and sensitise enumerators to tread carefully while gathering information. Enumerators will be told not to demand information but seek it gently.

“We will tell enumerators to proactively engage with people. For instance, if an old man in a village does not know his exact date or place of birth, the enumerator may engage in a conversation with the person that may elicit some anecdotes and roughly establish the year and the place of birth,” the census director said.

As of now, the NPR questionnaire has 21queries, but officials say it has not yet been finalised.

With most of the census and NPR data gathering and storage happening digitally this time, the challenge before census officials is to convince people that the data would remain safe.

“Individual data is sealed and all that we can see is collective data. The information is consolidated and tailor-made. We are telling district officials to create awareness about data safety as well,” Kumar said.

Madikeri, Feb 23: Back-to-back floods and landslides in the last two years, has led to a fall in the number of tourists coming to the coffee-growing region of Kodagu, forcing the district administration to intervene and take confidence-building measures, telling tourists that Kodagu was safe to visit.

According to the statistics of the Karnataka State Tourism Department, Kodagu recorded a moderately good number of tourists in 2018 and 2019, the years that the district witnessed devastating floods and landslides.

The Department’s statistics reveal that 17 lakh tourists visited Kodagu in 2018 and 18 lakh in 2019. This means the flood-ravaged years did attract tourists contrary to what the stakeholders had claimed.

Mangaluru, Jan 3: S Cube Art Gallery has successfully concluded its prestigious assignment from Airports Authority of India (AAI) to beautify Mangaluru Airport with artistic works. AAI had invited tenders for various jobs to be executed in the airport premises. S Cube Art Gallery had made a competitive bid which was subsequently followed up with presentation before selection panel and award of contract. S Cube Art Gallery bagged the contract for six works in two sectors out of the total four sectors for which the tender had been called.

The themes presented by S Cube Art Gallery showcase the Tulu culture and heritage of the people of Coastal Karnataka. The six themes selected are:

1. ‘Human Hand Flying Paper Plane’ – fibre glass and steel sculpture work installed in the circle in the outer precincts of the airport. This is a larger than life sculpture signifying the dreams and aspirations of the air travelers. Artist: Harish Kodialbail, Mangalore

2. ‘Kambala’ – fibre glass sculpture installed at the exit area of the airport. This sculpture is meant to introduce ‘Kambala’, the iconic folk sport of the region to the visitors and tourists. Artist: Harish Kodialbail, Mangalore

3. ‘Fisherman with Boat’ - fibre glass and steel sculpture installed at the entrance to departures lounge of the airport. It symbolizes the fishing culture of the coastal region depicting the soaring aspirations, life of courage and adventure as well as the daily struggles of the fisher folk. Artist: Harish Kodialbail, Mangalore

4. ‘Tiger Dance’ - fibre glass and steel sculpture installed at the arrivals lounge of the airport. This work depicts the world famous ‘Mangalore Pilivesha’ showing tiger dancers in various typical postures to the visiting tourists. Artist: Harish Kodialbail, Mangalore

5. ‘Folk Art Forms’ – six individual terracotta sculptures with Tulunadu cultural themes installed alongside the domestic and international corridors of the airport. Artist: Venki Palimaru, Udupi

6. ‘Jain Miniature Paintings’ – Jain miniature paintings (18x6 feet) – Two works of acrylic on canvas displayed on the wall on either sides of the exit area. The work was conceived after referring to authentic traditional Jain paintings in Moodbidri Jain Mutt and Shravanabelagola Mutt. Artist: Reshma S. Shetty, Mangalore

The total value of the contract was Rs. 56 lakhs. The work was completed over a period of six months and concluded in the month of July, 2019.  S Cube Art Gallery is grateful to the Airports Authority of India for giving the opportunity to participate in this project and showcase the artistic talents of the region.