No runway expansion at Mangaluru Airport for now

Mangaluru, Apr 23: The scarcity of water in Kukkavu area of Belthangady town in Dakshina Kannada district has forced school-going children to dig a well with their hands.
The children studying in primary schools were seen lifting the heavy buckets of water from the well.

The residents were facing the water shortage from the past couple of days, amid the coronavirus lockdown.
A group of five adolescents managed to dug the well as deep as 12 feet within just a span of four days.

" We are facing water problem now. With the support of my five more friends, we dug this well. At the beginning we just found soil, then in the deeper layers, we also found stones. We got access to the water at 10 feet down," said Dhanush, a class 9th student, while speaking to news agency.

The shortage of water during the summer months is a perennial problem in across several states in India, and the growing population has only added to the woes.

In extreme conditions, poor have to draw water from small water holes.

Bengaluru, Jan 24: After the visit of fact finding committee members to the spot, the Christian community here decided to submit a report to the state government urging to install a 114-ft. statue of Jesus Christ at Kapala Betta in Kanakapura taluk of Ramanagaram district, Congress MLC Ivan D’souza said here on Thursday.

While talking to media, Mr D’souza said the committee would submit the report to Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa and Revenue Minster R. Ashok and urge the government to construct the statue at the earliest.

The RSS and other BJP outfits have strongly opposed the installation, following which the government ordered suspension of the work. A few days ago, Kalladka Prabhakar, RSS ideologue, took out a rally in Kanakapura opposing the installation.

Bengaluru, Jan 2: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday slammed states, which have not enrolled with the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Yojana (PMKSY), saying that such petty politics has done great damage to the farming community.

"I expect that in the new year, those states which are not associated with the Kisan Samman Yojana will at least become a part of it this year," the Prime Minister said at a function in Tumakuru where he disbursed Rs 12,000 crore to six crore beneficiaries under the government scheme in one-go.

Also, he gave away the Krishi Karman Award to the selected farmers and distributed fishing equipment to the chosen ones on the occasion. Modi said political considerations by the state governments in implementing the PMKSY has caused severe loss to the poor farmers.

"Such politics has never strengthened the farmers. Our government understood your (farmers') needs, requirements and your aspirations and accordingly tried to implement the schemes," said Modi.

He further said his government never saw agriculture in fragments but in its totality. Claiming his government has ensured that the entire money reached the poor beneficiaries, Prime Minister hit out at the previous governments, when middlemen ruled the roost.

"There was a time when a rupee was rolled out (by the government) for the poor person, only 15 paise would reach him. The middlemen would pocket the remaining 85 paise. "Today, whatever money is dispatched from Delhi, the entire amount directly reaches the bank account of the beneficiary," he said.

He told the gathering about the various initiatives taken by his government to improve the agriculture sector such as completing the pending irrigation schemes, soil health card and 100 per cent neem-coating in urea.

Due to the initiatives of the government, agriculture production has gone up, he said. Speaking about measures in the fisheries sector, the Prime Minister said the sector has been promoted in the villages, financial help given to fishermen, modernisation of boats and building fisheries-related infrastructure have been done.