BJP central leaders back Yediyurappa: BSY regime will be stable, says Amit Shah

Bengaluru, May 5: The Karnataka excise department booked a case against a wine shop owner in this tech city for allegedly selling more liquor than permitted under the law to a buyer on the first day of shops reopening for business after 40-day lockdown on Monday, an official said on Tuesday.

"We have booked a case against licensed shop owner S. Venkatesh for reportedly selling Indian made liquor (IML) and beer to a buyer on Monday more than he is permitted under the Karnataka Excise Act section 36," Bengaluru South Excise Deputy Commissioner A. Giri told media persons.

The alleged sale came to light when the unidentified customer posted in the social media a receipt showing he bought liquor worth Rs 52,841 from Vanilla Spirit Zone in the city''s south-eastern suburb on Monday afternoon.

"Preliminary investigation revealed that 17.4 litres of IML was sold against the permissible limit of 2.3 litres and 35.1 litres of beer against the legal limit of 18.2 litres," Giri said.

Venkatesh, however, told Giri that the buyer paid for the liquor bought by him and seven of his colleagues at the same time from the shop as they entered together.

"We are investigating to ascertain if Venkatesh violated the license conditions by paying for liquor bought by his friends with him at the same time," Giri added.

Jan 2: A year after 12,000 acres of forests in Bandipur went up in smoke, the Karnataka Forest Department is gearing up for the summer even as the Forest Survey of India (FSI) has cautioned that 22.78 lakh acres (9,222 sq km) or about 20% of the green cover spread across three districts in the central part of the state is fire-prone.

The FSI studied forest fire incidents across the country between 2004-05 and 2017 before coming up with state-specific inputs.

According to the 13-year observation, Karnataka has 7,352 “fire points” or areas measuring 5 km X 5 km with frequent fire incidents.

Though the number is lower compared to states like Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Odisha with over 20,000 points, the sheer spread of the fire-prone area itself is a challenge for the Karnataka Forest Department.

According to data, about three lakh acres (1,199.9 sq km) of forest area is very highly fire prone with 26 to 52 fire incidents in 13 years. This is followed by 7.6 lakh acres (3,067 sq km) of “highly fire prone” areas with an average of one to two incidents every year.

Almost all of the “red alert” areas are concentrated in Uttara Kannada, Chikkmagaluru, Shivamogga and Chamarajanagar districts. As temperature rises at the end of January, so does the risk of forest fires, requiring officials to be on vigil till the end of summer.

After an investigation into the Bandipur blaze revealed that faulty fire lines and poor supervision were the reason for the spread of the fire, the department has come up with a multi-pronged approach to prevent similar incidents this year.

“After the Bandipur incident, we have created a fire cell and a standard operating procedure (SOP) which everyone has to follow. Firstly, a fire management plan is prepared and approved by a competent authority.

The SOP has well defined firelines which have to be executed by December-end and burning must be completed by January 15,”  Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Head of Forest Force) Punati Sridhar told DH.

He said that to ensure its strict implementation, GPS readings of firelines are to be submitted for random verification.

“All the required equipment from fire jackets to shoes, gloves, backpack sprayers and tractors mounted with 2,000-5,000 litre tanks with high pressure pumps will be deployed at vantage points,” he said.

In addition, the department’s fire cell works in collaboration with the Karnataka State Remote Sensing Applications Centre (KSRSAC) to give fire alerts within half and hour of an area catching fire and detected by satellites.

“Earlier, the gap used to be four hours by when the fire would have spread beyond control. Now, with reduced time gap, it would be easier to control fire early,” he added.

Bengaluru, Jul 15: Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee President D K Shivakumar on Tuesday alleged Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa led state government of corruption and said it had not spared even beds and pillows meant for COVID-19 patients to make "corrupt" money.

Taking to microblogging site Twitter, Congress leader said BJP government will be exposed in the coming days.

"It is nauseating that @BSYBJP govt has not even spared the beds and pillows meant for CoVid patients to make corrupt money from. There are many such scams involving ministers. Evidences about them will be placed before people and the BJP Govt will be exposed in the coming days," he tweeted.

Cabinet minister Jagadish Shettar on Monday announced a complete lockdown in Karnataka's Dharwad area from 10 am on July 15 to 8 pm on July 24 in a bid to control the rising number of COVID-19 cases.

According to the State's health department, Karnataka has a total of 41,581 positive cases so far, including 24,572 active cases and 16,248 recoveries.

So far, 757 people have lost their lives to coronavirus in the State.