Mangaluru: Cops seize nearly 12 kg ganja, arrest two peddlers

Bengaluru, May 9: The Karnataka government may not extend the daily working hours from 8 to 12, with Labour Minister A Shivaram Hebbar saying on Saturday that the move would neither benefit the industries nor workers.

Hebbar said that the proposal has not been discussed and it may come for final deliberations next week. He also noted that some States have already extended the working hours. More than extending working hours, there should be employment to be given. If there are no jobs what can be done by extending working hours? If it is done (working hours extended to 12 hours), it would neither benefit workers nor industries. Let's see what happens, he said.

Asked if the government was in favour of the extension, he said, "I don't think it will be ready for the (12 hour) proposal." Meanwhile, the Minister also said that their top priority now was to see that all MSMEs start operating again, salaries are paid to employees and there are no job losses for any reason. If industries don't reopen, how can workers get their employment? We should think in parallel, Hebbar said adding, the government was keeping the interests of both MSMEs and workers in mind.

He urged the Centre to offer a relief package to the MSME sector, saying it is facing very difficult times due to the adverse impact of the COVID-19-induced lockdown, and also noting its role in generating large-scale employment and feeding large industries.

The BJP-led government has done whatever within its limitations to help the MSMEs, he said. Earlier this week, the Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa announced that the monthly fixed charges of electricity bills of MSMEs would be waived for two months. MSMEs have suffered huge production losses due to the lockdown. It takes some time for them to revive, Yediyurappa had said. The Chief Minister had also said payment of fixed charges in the electricity bills of the large industries will be deferred without penalty and interest for a period of two months.

Bengaluru, Jul 10: With 2,313 more people testing positive for coronavirus in Karnataka in the last 24 hours, its overall tally of patients rose to 33,418 on Friday, health officials said.

57 patients died in Karnataka in the last 24 hours, with majority (27) of them from Bengaluru, taking the state''s death toll to 543, the officials added.

Bengaluru accounted for 1,447 or 63 per cent of the new COVID-19 cases, spiking its tally to 15,329, out of which 11,687 are active cases.

The city alone accounts for 46 per cent of all the cases in the state.

As many as 45 deaths had Severe Acute Respiratory Infection (SARI) as a common symptom.

Among the new cases, excluding Bengaluru, Dakshina Kannada accounted for 139 infections, followed by Vijayapura (89), Ballari (66), Kalaburagi (58), Yadgir and Mysuru (51 each) among others.

On Friday, a record 1,003 patients got discharged, 601 of them in Bengaluru alone with the total number of discharges rising up to 13,836.

Until now, Karnataka has tested 7.79 lakh samples for Covid, out of which 7.28 lakh tested negative.

Despite the record number of discharges, patients in ICU rose to 472.

Of the 33,418 cases, 19,035 are active in the state.