Congress MLAs misusing minorities’ funds for poll purposes: Shobha Karandlaje

Hassan, Mar 13: In what could have been a major tragedy, an under construction flyover across Hassan-Mangaluru railway level crossing, near the new KSRTC Bus stand here collapsed today.

Fortunately no casualties occurred despite six concrete beems of 50 feet height, collapsed and broke into pieces.

The much awaited project was completely neglected by the successive governments for over a decade due to politics.  It was sanctioned eight months ago.

The Rs 42 crore project was taken up by a joint venture between state, center and South Eastern railway. The contractor or the Engineer were not present when the incident occurred.

Blaming the contractor, the locals alleged that poor quality of work led to the incident. No contractor or engineer was present even during construction, they added. Siddaiah, who runs an eatery near KSRTC bus stand said that it could have been a major tragedy if people were underneath the flyover when it crashed. The incident should be probe and the contractor should be punished, he added.

Karwar, Jun 3: The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has issued an alert, predicting thundershowers and heavy rainfall over north interior Karnataka, coastal Dakshina Kannada and Udupi over the next three days.

With Cyclone Nisarga hitting the Uttara Kannada coast on Tuesday,  parts of coastal Karnataka received heavy rainfall. Gusty winds tore through the coastal towns, as the sea too turned violent with rough waves smashing the shore.

The alert was issued with the advancement of Nisarga from east-central Arabian Sea to north Maharashtra, and adjoining south Gujarat coast. “Though it does not cover Karnataka, the range of cyclonic winds is very big and reaches north interior Karnataka also.

So an alert has been called out,” CS Patil, director in-charge, IMD, Bengaluru, said. The weather department has forecast a severe cyclonic storm and then a depression. Patil said formation of systems is a common factor before the onset of the monsoon and they help in its advancement.

“Cyclone Nisarga is helping in the quick advancement of the southwest monsoon to Karnataka, and the monsoon is likely to arrive before the scheduled date as conditions are favourable,” he added.

Bengaluru, Jan 5: B S Yediyurappa-led Karnataka cabinet has finally decided to resume supply of subsidised rice and wheat to students of welfare institutions and hostels including those run by religious mutts under the Dasoha Scheme’s welfare programme. The supply was stopped over two months ago.

“Cabinet has decided to continue supply of subsidised foodgrains (rice and wheat) for the benefit of 37,700 children under the Dasoha scheme in 351 welfare institutions for the next one year at the cost of Rs 18 crore,” said J C Madhuswamy, Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister. Under this scheme, institutions that provide free accommodation and food for students are entitled to avail 10 kg rice and 5 kg wheat per student every month at subsidised rates. But following a central government directive in November, the state government had stopped supply to private institutions since December.

Hours before the cabinet meeting, Khader addressed a press conference and said, “This government is snatching away food from children by stalling the supply of foodgrains. Institutions like Suttur Mutt, Siddaganga Mutt that have worldwide fame for their service are being inconvenienced by this,” Khader said.

Finding itself in a fix, especially in a matter that involves mutts, the cabinet was quick to restore the supply. “Foodgrains were being supplied to 183 government-run institutions and 281 institutions run by private entities. As per a central government directive, supply to private institutions was stopped but the decision was made by the previous government,” Shashikala Jolle, Women and Child Development Minister, said.