Raheem Uchil terms BSY govt ‘pro-Beary’ as it sanctions Rs 6-cr for Beary Bhavan

Mangaluru, Ma 9: Three more persons from Bantwal taluk in Dakshina Kannada district tested positive for Covid-19 today. All three are members of a family.

The infection is reportedly linked to First Neuro Hospital of Mangaluru, which has emerged as a coronavirus hub in coastal Karnataka.

With this, the total number of coronavirus cases in the district mounted to 31 including six outsiders. Three of them have lost their lives. Currently there are 15 active cases in the district.

The newly identified coronavirus patients are a 30-year-old man and two elderly women aged 60 and 70 years.

They have contracted the infection from a 69-year-old man from Bantwal who was confirmed with COVID-19 infection on May 1. All the three members now infected belong to his family.

The man had got the infection from a woman identified as P-390. He happens to be a relative and neighbour of the deceased woman who belonged to Bantwal Kasaba village. Eight  members of his family were quarantined, of whom three tested positive today.

Bengaluru, May 13: Former chief minister and senior Congress leader Siddaramaiah on Wednesday called the measures announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman as 'disastrous' and said it is 'non-existent' in terms of benefits to poor migrants, labourers, contract employees and farmers.

"The first set of measures announced by @FinMinIndia @nsitharaman, after 8 PM speech by @narendramodi, is disastrous & non-existent in terms of benefits to poor migrants, labourers, contract employees, farmers, etc," Siddaramaiah said in a tweet.

The Congress leader said most of the intended benefits may not reach the end recipient.

This comes a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a Rs 20 lakh crore special economic package to revive the COVID-19 hit economy.

"The contribution by the government for the schemes announced are mostly notional and less of actuals and the devil lies in the detail," the Congress leader said in another tweet.

After Sitharaman announced support measures for MSMEs, Siddaramaiah said, "The credit infusion to MSMEs may help them clear dues to vendors but it is doubtful if they shall utilise the credit available to pay their labourers & to prevent job cuts. @FinMinIndia should have taken measures to pay part of the salaries to the employees in MSMEs."

Further questioning the Centre on 'ignoring the spending for boosting consumption', Siddaramaiah said, "The government is interested in capital infusion in the form of credits but totally ignorant of the actual spending that needs to be done to boost consumption. How can credit be considered as government spending?"

Siddaramaiah said the next set of measures should benefit the marginalised sections.

"Will be looking forward to next set of measures & I hope it will be something to benefit the marginalised sections. Direct benefits to the poorest sections will help them survive this pandemic. COVID-19 fight should not be another perception battle but a real one," he added in another tweet.

Sitharaman earlier announced Rs 3 lakh crore collateral-free automatic loans for businesses, including MSMEs.

Besides this, she also stated that to provide stressed MSMEs with equity support, the government will facilitate the provision of Rs 20,000 crore as subordinate debt.

Jan 30: One positive case of novel coronavirus has been found in Kerala. The student was studying at Wuhan University in China. The patient is stable and is being closely monitored.

This is the first case of coronavirus that has been reported in India.

Until now, there have only been many suspected cases across the country. A total of eight patients, five of them in Mumbai, are under observation in Maharashtra for suspected coronavirus infection. Six patients were already under observation and two more people, who complained of cough and mild fever, symptoms similar to the coronavirus, were put under medical watch on Tuesday evening.

One suspected case each has been reported in Rajasthan and Chandigarh.

Novel coronavirus (nCoV) is a large family of viruses that causes illnesses ranging from the common cold to acute respiratory syndromes. However, the virus that has so far killed 170 people and affected 7,000 in China is a novel strain and not seen before.

It has emerged from a seafood and animal market in Wuhan city and is suspected to have spread to as far as the United States.

According to the World Health Organisation, the common symptoms of the novel coronavirus strain include respiratory symptoms such as fever, cough, shortness of breath and breathing difficulties.