10 Indian beaches including one in Udupi to be converted into global quality

coastaldigest.com news network
January 29, 2018

Udupi, Jan 29: The Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change plans to convert India’s 10 popular sea beaches into international quality Blue Flag destination in 2018 to ensure cleanliness and safety of these beaches. Among the 10 beaches, Padukere Beach located near Malpe in Karnataka’s Udupi district has been listed on the Blue Flag list.

Welcoming the move, Karnataka tourism Director Manjula said that her department already had listed Padukere beach as it fits into most of 33 categories listed by the ministry to select.

All the coastal states have nominated the pilot beaches. Formal nominations are, however, awaited from Union territories like Daman and Diu, Puducherry, Lakshadweep and Andaman and Nicobar islands. Sources said that Andaman would be the only place from where two beaches might be selected for the Blue Flag certification.

These ten beaches are being taken up as demonstration projects. Once they are cleaned up, 90 more beaches would be turned into Blue Flag zones.

The Blue Flag is a certification by the Foundation for Environmental Education to ensure following a set of stringent standards to clean up the popular seaside destinations.

None of the Indian beaches carry this certification, while Spain has 578 Blue Flag beaches. Other countries with a large number of Blue Flag beaches are Turkey (436), Greece (395), Italy (342) and Portugal (299).

The developmental activities along the beach would include the creation of toilets and proper management of the waste material generated by tourists.

According to the existing Coastal Regulatory Zone (CRZ) regulations, developmental activities are permitted in CRZ-2 (urban) and CRZ-3 (rural) areas. However, construction is prohibited in the CRZ-1 areas, which is they are between the high tide line and low tide line along the 7,500 km coastline.

International tourists

Pramod Madhwaraj, Karnataka Minister for Fisheries, Youth Empowerment and Sports, and Udupi district in-charge said that getting the certification would help in attracting international tourists to the beach.

An amount of Rs. 69 lakh had been spent to improve the road connectivity to Padukere. The construction of toilets and gazebos would be taken up at Padukere beach.

The beach facing the Arabian Sea, separated from Malpe fisheries harbour by the Udyavara rivulet, had now got road connectivity from Malpe. Hence efforts were being made to develop both the beaches.

A large number of youth in Malpe were dependent on fisheries. But tourism was a growing sector. The objective was also to create employment opportunities in the tourism sector.

The Malpe beach, the St. Mary’s Island (about 6.5 km from Malpe) and the Padukere beach along with the Sea Walkway will attract more tourists here and facilitate the development of tourism, Mr. Madhwaraj said.

Also Read: Karnataka’s first Sea Walkway opens to public at Malpe

Comments

Hari
 - 
Monday, 29 Jan 2018

What were the criterias for selecteing pilot beaches? Is that most polluted beaches? They will expand to all beaches in Karnataka?

Kumar
 - 
Monday, 29 Jan 2018

Great project. People also should cooperate to this project. Without them proper implementation wont happen

Ganesh
 - 
Monday, 29 Jan 2018

Great news. It will give more mileage to beach tourism in Karnataka

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News Network
June 24,2020

Bengaluru, Jun 24: Karnataka Minister of Medical Education Dr K Sudhakar said on Tuesday that the directors of institutions will be held responsible if any there are any complaints and lack of facilities in the treatment of COVID-19 patients.

'Since a couple of days, there are reports in media regarding the admission of COVID-19 patients, lack of hygiene and the supply of sub-standard food to patients. The country is appreciating Karnataka and Bengaluru for controlling the spread of coronavirus. This was possible due to tireless efforts from past several months and these kinds of reports emerging now cannot be tolerated," Sudhakar said.

He added, "There can be no compromise in the treatment of COVID-19 patients. It must be ensured that these kinds of complaints will not be repeated. Directors of hospitals will be held responsible if there are complaints."

The medical education minister further said that asymptomatic patients will be kept in COVID-Care Centres and if they develop symptoms in the care centres, they will be shifted to hospitals for further treatment.

"Since the COVID-19 cases are increasing, private hospitals have been roped in to treat coronavirus patients. Officials have to ensure that beds are reserved and all arrangements are made as per the government order. Guidelines will soon be issued for monitoring asymptomatic cases in COVID care centres," he added.

Karnataka on Tuesday reported 322 fresh COVID-19 positive cases and eight deaths.
According to the state health department, the total number of positive cases has mounted to 9,721 and 150 deaths. So far, 6,004 people have been discharged.

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Agencies
February 11,2020

Dubai, Feb 11: An Indian national has been diagnosed with the novel coronavirus in the UAE, bringing the total number of confirmed infection cases to eight, the country's health ministry has said.

The death toll in China's coronavirus outbreak has gone up to 1,016 while the confirmed cases of infection have soared to 42,638, Chinese health officials said on Tuesday.

The UAE Ministry of Health and Prevention (MoHAP) said on Monday that the Indian national was infected after he interacted with a recently diagnosed person.

"The Ministry of Health and Prevention announced today the eighth confirmed case of new coronavirus in the UAE, which is an Indian national who had interacted with a recently diagnosed person," it said in a tweet.

On Sunday, the ministry said that the two new patients, a Chinese national and a Filipino, had been diagnosed with the disease and were receiving medical care as per the highest health standards available in the country.

It said that all health facilities will continue to report any new cases suspected to have coronavirus.

Last week, a family of four who arrived from Wuhan for a holiday in Dubai were diagnosed with coronavirus. A fifth patient, who also arrived from the Chinese city, was confirmed to have been infected with 
the virus, but is reportedly in a stable condition.

China and countries around the world are scrambling to contain the spread of coronavirus which fiirst surfaced in Wuhan city in the Central Hubei province of China. Apart from China, two deaths have occurred in Hong Kong and the Philippines.

Besides Germany, Britain and Italy, other European nations with cases of the virus include France, Russia, Belgium, Sweden, Finland and Spain.

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News Network
February 28,2020

Bengaluru, Feb 28: The Liquefied Petroleum Gas penetration in Karnataka is 'absolutely 100 per cent' due to the Prime Minister Ujjwala Yojana, Indian Oil Corporation Karnataka Executive Director D L Pramodh said here on Friday.

In 2014, LPG penetration in the State was only 68 per cent, but after the PMUY, massive number of gas connections were given in the last five years, he said, adding, "It is absolutely 100 per cent today."

"There are 1.6 crore LPG connections out of which around 31.5 lakh -- or around 20 per cent -- come under the PMUY. The 100 per cent LPG penetration in the state will help women in rural areas to make their kitchens smokeless. Against the national average of 2.88 cylinders per family per PMUY annually, the figure is Karnataka 3.4 cylinders in Karnataka," Pramodh told reporters.

On the initiative of blending ethanol with petrol, he said it's 8.6 per cent in Karnataka, the highest comparedto other states, where it's five per cent to 5.5 per cent. The state aims to increase it to 10 per cent. By March 31, the IOC would commission the Rs 10 crore Vapour Recovery System at the Devanagonthi terminal on the city outskirts which would ensure that vapour does not go out in the air when tankers are being filled with fuel. "This is an important measure taken tominimise pollution", he said.

Pramodh also said the IOC has started mobile fuel dispensers, delivering fuels at the doorsteps.

Regarding the IOC's preparedness for Electric Vehicle charging stations, Pramodh said the Ministry of Power has given the company a target to set up 500 charging stations across India in the first phase. The IOC has already signed MoUs with NTPC, Power Grid Corporation Limited, Hyundai Motors, Tech Mahindra and Tata Power in this regard.

In Karnataka, 58 sites have been identified for setting up charging and battery swapping stations.

"Total electric vehicle charging facilities planned by IOC in Karnataka by March 31 is 34, out of which 26 will be EVcharging sites and eight battery swapping stations," Pramodh said.

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