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Chitradurga, Feb 10: President of the BJP State unit Nalin Kumar Kateel on Sunday hit out at Congress leader M. Mallikarjun Kharge for allegedly likening Prime Minister Narendra Modi to a “zero candle bulb”.

Mr. Kateel told reporters here that Mr. Modi was a “1,000 watt bulb that gave light to the world”, and compared Mr. Kharge to a lamp that had burned out politically.

Mr. Kateel charged that Mr. Kharge had become frustrated after losing the elections and after his party did not even consider him for a Rajya Sabha seat. And this had made the Congress leader to make wild charges against the Prime Minister.

Lashing out at the Congress, Mr. Kateel alleged that the Congress was continuing the “divide and rule” policy of the British and accused the former Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda of being the “other face of the Congress”.

Mr. Kateel also came down on the former Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. He ridiculed the Congress for the delay in choosing a new KPCC chief after Dinesh Gundu Rao submitted his resignation.

Karnataka on Saturday reported 12 new cases, the highest in a single day so far, taking the tally in the state to 76.

Late at night, the Mysuru district commissioner said five more people had tested positive in the district. But it was yet to be confirmed by the state health department.

Of the cases, 41 are from Bengaluru, eight from Chikkaballapur, while Uttara Kannada and Dakshina Kannada districts have seven each.

Interestingly, the highest number of patients are those from Dubai or those who had transit travel via Dubai. Out of 76 cases, 17 cases (22%) have travel history to Dubai, the capital of Emirate of Dubai and the most populous city in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Medical Education Minister Dr K Sudhakar, who is also in-charge of COVID-19 operations, said that Dubai has been a major concern as far as Karnataka COVID-19 patients are concerned. “Most of the positive cases have come through Dubai suggesting something amiss there,” he said. 

Echoing the same, Dr Prakash Kumar, Joint Director, Communicable Diseases, Department of Health and Family Welfare, said, “The layover in Dubai is around six to seven hours. We are seeing Dubai to be the new epicentre of the virus as far as India is concerned.”

UAE was initially not on the list of countries from where passengers were screened. It was added much later when clusters of patients with travel history to Dubai began popping up all over the country.

Patient-19 has infected the maximum so far.

Out of the 12 cases that tested positive on Saturday, five are contacts of Patient 19. All of them are being treated at a Chikkaballapur hospital. Two of them are from Hindupur, Andhra Pradesh, and three are residents of Gauribidanur taluk in Chikkabalapur district.

P19, a 31-year-old man from Chikkaballapur, had travelled to Mecca, Saudi Arabia, and returned to India on March 14. Existing patient clusters suggest that P19 had infected the maximum number of people. Officials did not reveal how many people he originally travelled with to Mecca.

Amid the rise in cases, Jawaid Akhtar, Additional Chief Secretary (Health), maintained that the state had not reached stage 3. But he had no definitive answer as to how the Mysuru patient contracted the virus despite health officials he was in touch with not testing positive.

Health Commissioner Pankaj Kumar Pandey said around 1,000 primary contacts of all positive cases have been classified as high-risk and low-risk. The high-risk patients are in government hospitals while the low-risk ones in quarantine facilities.

Bengaluru, May 2: Former chief minister and Congress leader Siddaramaiah have urged the state government to arrange free-transport facilities to those stranded labourers and their family members to return their native places.

In a statement issued here on Friday, the former chief minister criticised the State Government for having decided to collect bur fare from them, ''three-times more than the regular fare''.

Stating that the migrant labourers, who had been stranded ever since lockdown had been clamped in the entire country are not in a position to pay for their travel, Siddaramaiah urged the state government to treat them with human face.