Mangaluru: BBA student who thrashed principal arrested, finally

Bengaluru, June 11: Amulya Leona, a college student, who was charged with sedition for raising "Pakistan zindabad" slogans in Bengaluru, has finally been granted bail. 

The court had denied her bail yesterday, saying she might abscond. But her lawyers had been pursuing another way of getting her out of jail where she has spent nearly four months.

Ms Leona's advocate, Prasanna R, said that the delay of the state in submitting a chargesheet in the case beyond the stipulated time meant she was eligible for "default bail".

"The default bail application was moved before the magistrate under whose jurisdiction the alleged crime was committed. The chargesheet has not been submitted by the state within 90 days. So default bail has been granted. We had moved the default bail plea on May 26 and again on May 29 when the court told us the earlier mail IDs had been disabled. A physical application was filed on June 2. The state filed the chargesheet on June 3," the lawyer said.

While the state tried to argue that they were entitled to an extension in the time allotted, the court hearing this aspect of the case gave an order favourable to Ms Leona. The process is on to release her.

The arrest of Ms Leona during a rally against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act or CAA in Bengaluru had led to a debate on the use of sedition charges.

The woman on a Facebook post had also said "zindabad" to many countries including India and Pakistan. She did also try to chant "Hindustan zindabad", but was soon silenced and whisked away. She was accused of sedition, causing enmity between communities and causing deliberate mischief.

Bengaluru, Jun 5: Karnataka registered its highest single-day spike of more than 500 new COVID-19 cases, taking the total number of infections in the state to 4,835, the health department said on Friday.

The previous biggest single-day spurt was recorded on June 2 with 388 cases.

Of the 515 fresh cases reported, 482 are returnees from other states, mostly (about 471) from neighboring Maharashtra. Udupi district saw a major spike with over 200 cases today and the total tally of the district breaching seven hundred cases mark, to stand at 768.

As of June 5 evening, cumulatively 4,835 COVID-19 positive cases have been confirmed in the state, which includes 57 deaths and 1,688 discharges, the department said in its bulletin.

It said, out of 3,088 active cases, 3,075 patients are in isolation at designated hospitals and are stable, while 13 are in ICU.

On Friday, 83 patients have been discharged.

According to state COVID-19 war room data, out of the total 4,835 cases, 93 per cent (4,488 cases) are asymptomatic and 7 per cent (347) are symptomatic.

The new cases include 471 from Maharashtra, three from Delhi, two each from Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Haryana, and one from Tamil Nadu.

While one is with international travel history from Indonesia. Remaining cases include- contacts of patients earlier tested positive, those from containment zones, those who travelled from other districts, and the ones whose contact history is still being traced.

Among the districts where new cases were reported, Udupi accounts for 204 cases, followed by 74 from Yadgir, Vijayapura 53, Kalaburagi 42, Bidar 39, Belagavi 36, Mandya 13, Bengaluru Rural 12, Bengaluru Urban 10, Dakshina Kannada 8, Uttara Kannada 7, three each from Hassan, Dharwad and Chikkaballapura, two each from Ramanagara and Haveri, and one each from Davangere, Bagalkote, Ballari and Kolar.

Udupi district tops the list of positive cases, with a total of 768 infections, followed by Kalaburagi 552 and Bengaluru urban 434.

Among discharges, Bengaluru urban still tops the list with total 271 discharges, followed by Davangere 147 and Mandya 146.

A total of 3,60,720 samples were tested so far, out of which 13,627 were tested on Friday alone.

So far 3,49,951 samples have reported as negative, and out of them 12,797 were reported negative on Friday.

Tirumala, Jul 16: As many as 14 priests of Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanams (TTD) were tested positive for COVID-19 in Andhra Pradesh on Thursday, said Anil Kumar Singhal, Executive officer, TTD.

Singhal also held a meeting with temple priests, health and vigilance officials today.

On July 14, Singhal held 'Dial your EO' programme at TTD administrative building conference hall wherein the EO addressed the devotees and media and informed that 91 TTD employees have tested positive for COVID-19 till date.

According to the Union Health Ministry, the state has reported 35,451 COVID-19 cases including, 16,621 active cases, 18,378 recovered and 452 deaths so far.