Besant Women's College awarded 'A' grade by NAAC

Bengaluru, July 20: The Karnataka government has reiterated that no final decision has so far been taken on reopening of schools in the state.

The clarification comes after minutes of the July 15 HRD ministry meeting where Karnataka education department officials said schools are reopening on September 1 went viral on social media. 

“The state government has not decided yet on starting schools. That they will reopen in September was only a general opinion expressed by our officials at the meeting. At present, we have no plans to start schools unless there is a conducive environment. There’s no need for anxiety,” said primary and secondary minister S Suresh Kumar.

Kumar said the government is involved in meeting the education sector’s changed priorities in the current scenario.

The minutes were of a virtual conference on school-safety plans, with representatives of state governments and Union territories expressing views on reopening of schools. 

Against the name of Karnataka, “After September 1” was written. Similar datelines were given by Kerala, Ladakh, Manipur, Rajasthan, Odisha and Andhra Pradesh, while in case of many other states it said “no decision”.

An education department official said Karnataka submitted to MHRD that it will be able to take a decision only after September 1, depending on the situation in the state.

Dubai, May 3: Over 150,000 Indians in the UAE, who wish to return home amid the coronavirus lockdown, have applied through the online registration process to the Indian missions here, according to media reports.

The Indian missions in the country last week opened online registration for the expatriates who wish to fly back home after getting stuck in the country amidst the lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic.

As of 6 pm on Saturday, we received more than 150,000 registrations, Consul General of India in Dubai Vipul told the Gulf News on Saturday.

A quarter of them want to return to their homeland after losing their jobs, he said.

According to a report in the Khaleej Times on Sunday, about 40 per cent of the applicants who have registered are blue-collared workers and 20 per cent are working professionals.

"Roughly 20 per cent have suffered job losses and about 55 per cent of the total applicants are from Kerala," Neeraj Aggarwal, Consul, Press, Information, Culture was quoted as saying in the report.

Aggarwal said that the figures would change as they are expecting registrations from workers from other states, including Telangana, Uttar Pradesh, and Bihar.

About 10 per cent of the applicants are visit and tourist visa holders who got stranded here due to the ongoing lockdown in India.

India extended the ongoing lockdown by two weeks from May 4 to contain the spread of the coronavirus that has affected nearly 40,000 people in the country.

Aggarwal said that a small number of the applications constitute those from pregnant women and other medical cases.

Since the online registration process was launched, the Consulate's website crashed several times due to the heavy rush of applicants wishing to register to fly back home.

The site has been working fine now though it took a lot of time for it to stabilise in the initial phase due to the heavy traffic, the counsel general said.

He said that the missions here have not yet received any information from the Indian government about the mode of transport of the stranded citizens, the prices of the tickets or how the COVID-19 test results of applicants would be assessed for their journey.

There are high-level discussions going on regarding these things, he said in the report.

Meanwhile, Norka (The Non Resident Keralites Affairs) said it has received a total of 398,000 applications from Keralites across the globe who wish to return home.

"Of which, the highest numbers are from the UAE. At least 175,423 applicants have signed up from the UAE," Norka said in an official statement on Saturday.

It also received 54,305 registrations from Saudi Arabia, 2,437 from the UK, 2,255 from the US, and 1,958 from Ukraine from those who wish to return to India, the Khaleej Times reported.

The coronavirus has infected 13,599 people and claimed 119 lives in the UAE, the Ministry of Health and Prevention said on Saturday.

The Bharatiya Janata Party workers belonging to Muslim community are bewildered over the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act. A considerable number of BJP’s Muslim workers have distanced themselves from the pro-CAA meetings being organised by the party in different parts of India.

There is a deep divide within members of the BJP minority wing, with many upset and angry with the party. During its membership drive in 2018 for the minority wing, BJP had enrolled lakhs of Muslims across India.

A senior Muslim member of the saffron party in Hyderabad explained, “We are very upset. There is no one listening to us within the party. Majority of the members are introspecting on their future role in the party. Few are vocal about it. Those, who believe they still have a future in the party, have decided to keep quiet on this issue.”

This is the reason why they are not attending the pro-CAA rallies or interacting with people. If anybody approaches and questions them about CAA, they maintain they have no idea, just like the common man. A member of the BJP belonging to the minority community says they have been hurt by the decision of the government on CAA.

“Shia Muslims in Pakistan are suffering. They have been targeted in that country from time to time. The BJP patronised a large number of Shia Muslims. The Shia community in Uttar Pradesh even sided with the BJP. But what has the community got in the end? The persecuted Shia minorities in Pakistan have not got justice,” the party member from minority community lamented.

There are 400 families belonging to the Shia community in Hyderabad, who have relatives in Karachi and Quetta in Pakistan. These Shias had migrated to Pakistan from the Nizam state after its accession to India. These families were hopeful that after aligning with BJP, there would be a reprieve for them. But the stand taken by BJP has left them in lurch. The CAA provides for granting Indian citizenship only to non-Muslim minorities from Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh.

“We have been left with nothing. Shias have not been politically active in all the three countries of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh and have suffered due to this reason. There was some hope in India, but even that has been lost now,” the minority wing leader remarked.

National vice president of BJP minority cell Farid Sheikh Liaquat Ali says, “Party workers and common people are asking the same question.”

I have told them what union home minister Amit Shah has said in Parliament, that CAA is not against Indian Muslims. But people are not convinced. Every meeting or social function that I attend, I find that people are angry and upset. I have been with the BJP for 33 years and whatever I hear from the people is being conveyed to the party.”

The incident that occurred at the madarasa in Uttar Pradesh has led to a pointed question: “If this can happen to Muslims in UP, will it not repeat elsewhere?”