Mangaluru: Gang of miscreants attacks four with lethal weapons; one critical

Mangaluru, Jul 10: The new team of office bearers of Mangalore Toastmasters Club for the year 2020-21 was installed in an online ceremony themed “Unlockdownable MTM” on 04th July, 2020. The new team will be led by Shraddha S Pai as President and her team consisting of Dr. Sapna Ramaraj as Vice President-Education, Ranjani Vittaldas as Vice President-Membership, Fiona Pinto as Vice President-Public Relations, Aashitha Shetty as Treasurer, Chandrashekar Palekar as Secretary and Oliver Lobo as Sergeant-at-arms. Dr. Ananth Prabhu, motivational speaker and cyber law investigator was the chief guest for the occasion.

In his speech, Dr. Ananth Prabhu emphasized the necessity for a paradigm shift towards cyber security with the rampant increase in digitization. He mentioned three out of fifteen skills that are absolutely necessary for anyone to be successful - how to impress people, independent living and surviving skills and how to bounce back when you fall. The remaining 15 can be found detailed in his book - The Samurai who sold his Suzuki which he presented to the outgoing and incoming Presidents.

Aashitha Shetty was the anchor for the program. Chandrashekar Palekar rendered the invocation and Benzita Ferrao welcomed the gathering. Outgoing President Kavitha Kamath thanked her entire team, mentors and the club members for their support during her tenure. Outgoing Vice President-Education Mareena Seema presented the Toastmaster of the year award to Distinguished Toastmaster M. N. Pai. Jyothi Hebbar presented an elaborate Secretary’s report highlighting the club’s happenings, events and achievements during the past year 2019-20.

Sunitha Periera introduced the 11 new members of the club who were then inducted by Division F Director Molly Chaudhuri. The Oath-taking of the new office bearers was presided over by Area F3 Director Sapna Shenoy. In her acceptance speech, Shraddha S Pai thanked the club members for putting their confidence in her and electing her to the new position. She spoke of her sense of debt and duty to those who held the office before her and promised to do her best in meeting the challenges in the coming year.

17 Representatives and leaders from different clubs of Division F including Club Growth Director Savitha Salian, Division Director Molly Chaudhuri and veteran toastmasters Malini Hebbar and Phyllis D’Costa felicitated the outgoing and incoming office bearers. Isha S Pai, daughter of newly sworn-in President Shraddha S Pai and Mrs. Vijaya Kudva, mother of outgoing President Kavitha Kamath also felicitated the new team. The vote of thanks was proposed by Princita Ferrao. Technical support was handled by Praveen M.N. and Yvonil D’Souza.

Mangalore Toastmasters club is built on 17 glorious years of support and encouragement of a healthy mix of veteran as well as rookie toastmasters. Bagging 93 educational awards, the club has placed 11th worldwide in the past year, upholding Toastmasters International’s core values of integrity, dedication to excellence, service to the member and respect for the individual.

Bengaluru, Jan 31: Senior IPS officer Praveen Sood is the new Head of Police Force in Karnataka as the current DG and IG Neelamani Raju today retired.

Praveen Sood, the DIG of CID’s Economic Offences Wing, introduced several reforms that sped up investigation processes. He introduced the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network System all over the state by networking all police stations in the country and ensuring data entry and retrieval of all information in police stations and higher police officers online.

Born in 1964, Sood graduated from IIT Delhi and joined the Indian Police Service in 1986. He kicked off his career as the Assistant Superintendent of Police in Mysuru in 1989. He has served as the SP of Ballari and Raichur before being posted as the Deputy Police Commissioner (Law and Order) of Bengaluru.

In 1999, he served as the police officer on foreign deputation as the police advisor to the Government of Mauritius for 3 years.  He was posted as Police Commissioner of Mysuru City between 2004 and 2007.

He took over as the Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic) in Bengaluru in 2008 and continued in the post till 2011. He has won the Chief Minister’s Gold Medal for excellence in service in 1996, the Police Medal for Meritorious Service in 2002  and the President’s Police Medal in 2011.

During 2013-14 he took over as Managing Director of Karnataka State Police Housing Corporation. He later worked as the Principal Secretary to the Home  Department as the Additional Director General of Police (Karnataka State Reserve Police) and the ADGP of Administration.

In 2017, he was appointed the Bengaluru Police Commissioner. He was also instrumental in launching “Suraksha” App and “Pink Hoyasalas” managed by all-women police officers.

As the DIG of the CID, Economic offences and Special Units, he is credited for opening the Centre for Cyber-crime Investigation, Training and Research for training police officers, prosecutors and the judiciary in handling cyber crime cases.

Mangaluru, Mar 16: As a precaution against the spread of Covid-19, the Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation (KSRTC) on Monday decided to cut down its premium, non-AC sleeper, Rajahamsa and express bus services from Mangaluru to Bengaluru and Kasaragod following poor patronage.

The cut down in services is as per the direction of KSRTC's Central office that wants bus services to be operated on priority.

KSRTC Mangaluru Divisional Controller S N Arun said that the corporation has decided to cut down 40 trips to Bengaluru. Concerning Kasaragod, it has reduced the number of trips from 40 to 35. "These include a reduction in services to Mysuru and Dharmasthala also," he added.