IFF deploys 1,200 volunteers in holy sites to serve Hajj pilgrims from India

Bengaluru, Mar 30: Chief Minister B S Yediyurappa on Sunday convened an all-party meeting and apprised the Opposition leaders about the measures taken by the government to contain the coronavirus in the state.

"I have been regularly holding meeting since March 13 regarding the measures taken to contain the transmission of COVID-19," the chief minister said at the meeting at the Vidhana Soudha.

Health Minister B Sriramulu, Medical Education Minister Dr K Sudhakar, IT-BT Minister C N Aswath Narayan, Deputy Chief Minister Laxman Savadi, former chief minister and Leader of the Opposition Siddaramaiah, Opposition MLAs H D Revanna, D K Shivakumar and former speaker K R Ramesh Kumar attended the meeting.

The chief minister said a task force comprising ministers and officials has been formed to oversee the implementation of the government orders.

Yediyurappa highlighted the prevailing situation across the globe saying that normal life had been paralysed everywhere.

The chief minister also apprised them about the number of clinics all over the state, availability of medicines and protection gear for the doctors and quarantine rooms in the state.

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.

Mangaluru, Feb 12: Mangaluru City Corporation’s (MCC) mayoral elections will be held on February 28, Urban Development Department has announced.

Yashwanth V, Regional Commissioner of Mysuru will be conducting the election in the city.

The election will be held as per the 21st term reservation roster according to which the mayoral candidate has to be a BCM ‘A’ candidate and the deputy mayoral candidate must be a woman from the general category.