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Mangaluru, July 8: Dakshina Kannada on Wednesday recorded its highest single-day spike in Covid-19 cases with 183 cases reported in the district, while Udupi reported 31 new cases.

DK also recorded two more fatalities – both patients with co-morbid conditions — taking the total death toll in the district to 28. Udupi has recorded three Covid-19 deaths.

The fresh spike saw total positive cases in DK shoot up to 1,542 and active cases to 819. As many as 12 patients were discharged from hospital on Wednesday. The positivity rate in the district now stands at 0.07 %. Health authorities as on date have received 22,181 samples and 20,153 out of 21,695 samples tested have turned out negative.

MLA’s gunman tests positive

The gunman assigned to former minister U T Khader tested positive on Wednesday and three others who were with him in the escort vehicle have been quarantined, said city police commissioner Vikash Kumar Vikash. A section of police commissioner’s office was shut for sanitisation as per protocol after staff working there were treated as primary contacts. The office per se has not been sealed contrary to ‘reports’ doing rounds in social media, he said.

Deputy commissioner Sindhu B Rupesh said the district reported two deaths — one late on Tuesday and the other during the day. The victims are a 57-year-old man and 32-year-old youth. Two of the 183 cases were secondary contacts, 25 were cases of influenza like illness, four cases of SARI, one a case of inter district travel, two with interstate travel, five with international travel history, 22 random samples and five pre-surgery samples.

Udupi district recorded 31 new cases taking the total positive cases recorded as on date to 1,421. Discharge of 1,189 patients meant that Udupi has 229 active cases.

Meanwhile, Kota Shrinivas Poojari, minister for fisheries on Wednesday inaugurated the Covid-19 lab at district hospital in Udupi. Karkala MLA Sunil Kumar inaugurated ambulance monitoring system to ensure expeditious transfer of infected patients to designated treatment centres.

Bengaluru, May 27: Amid uncertainty caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, which has disrupted school education in Karnataka, the state government is seeking the help of the Union Ministry of Information and Broadcasting to televise classes, a state minister said on Tuesday.

"We request you to provide minimum three channels on the Doordarshan network exclusively for the Department of Public Instruction, Government of Karnataka," Primary and Secondary Education Minister Suresh Kumar said in a letter to Union I&B Minister Prakash Javadekar.

Suggesting co-branding the channels under DD and the state education department, he asked for the channels to be mandatorily transmitted by the cable and DTH operators under the Cable Act.

The state education department has already discussed with Prasar Bharti officials, who, according Kumar, have assured 3+3 hours of timeslots on the education channel Chandana on cost basis.

"We have also made all the necessary arrangements for content creation by the teachers," he said.

Meanwhile, the minister has revealed that television is the best medium for the students as a home learning mode in these challenging times.

"The department of public instruction reviewed various technological options and considered TV as one of the best means for home learning," Kumar said.

In a survey conducted by the education department, it was found out that 95 per cent households had television sets.

Kumar said the state operates government schools in nine languages, including Kannada, English and Urdu.

"To cater to all the students, and considering a long-term strategy to run schools by maintaining social distancing, we are in immediate need of minimum three exclusive channels to teach through TV," he said.

According to Kumar, the Karnataka government is facing hardships to meet the capital expenditure requirements, hence, it is seeking help from the I&B Ministry.

Mangaluru, Jun 8: Forum Fiza Mall in Mangaluru on Monday reopened for public after Ministry of Home Affairs allowed the reopening of shopping malls from June 8 with certain precautionary measures amid COVID-19 pandemic.

People visited the mall wearing masks and maintaining social distancing.

Earlier, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had said that religious places and places of worship for public, hotels, restaurants and other hospitality services along with shopping malls will be permitted to open from June 8.

However, these facilities will not be able to resume operations inside containment zones designated by authorities in states, said a government notification.