Udupi: ‘Immoral police’ chase away girls and boys from Delta Beach

Udupi, Jun 24: Nearly four years after he was arrested in the murder case of NRI entrepreneur Bhaskar Shetty, the District Sessions court has granted conditional interim bail to Niranjan Bhat, one of the three prime accused in the case.

The development comes two days after the death of Niranjan’s father Srinivas Bhat(65). Though Srinivas and his driver Raghavendra were also arrested in the case on the accusation of destruction of evidence, they were released within a month.

Through his lawyer Niranjan had appealed to the court seeking bail to perform his father’s post-death rituals. 

After hearing the arguments, the court granted conditional interim bail till July 7 on furnishing a bond of Rs 5 lakh. The judge directed the accused to report to the court on or before July 7 to be taken into judicial custody.

Bhaskar Shetty, who owned a chain of supermarkets in Saudi Arabia, went missing from his house in Udupi on 28 July 2016. His mother Gulabi Shetty lodged a missing person complaint on July 29. The police arrested his wife Rajeshwari, her son Navaneeth and astrologer Niranjan Bhat on the charge of murdering Bhaskar Shetty and destroying the evidence, in Udupi on August 7, 2016. Rajeshwari is already out on bail. Navneet is still in prison.

Shetty was murdered at his house in Indrali and later his body was taken to Belman. It is alleged Niranjan Bhat had put the body of deceased Bhaskar Shetty in the pit used for Homa rituals and burnt it.

Bengaluru, May 14: Reformed underworld don Muthappa Rai, who was battling cancer for the past year, was said to be in a critical condition at Manipal Hospital in Bengaluru, late Wednesday night. Doctors said he was on life-support at the time of going to press. Rai (68), realtor, entrepreneur and founder of pro-Kannada organisation Jaya Karnataka, had retired from public life after he was diagnosed with cancer. He was part of an ongoing investigation into gangster Ravi Pujari, who was extradited from Senegal recently.

Born in Puttur into a Bunt family, he started out as a bank employee in Bengaluru, and later ran a live band restaurant. In 1994, he was shot in a Bengaluru court by a man dressed as a lawyer, after which he was bedridden for a couple of years.

Rai Moved to Dubai in 1996. He was deported from the UAE to India in 2002, and was arrested in Bengaluru when HT Sangliana was the police commissioner. Both Rai and Pujari had allegedly been associated with underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.

Bengaluru, Mar 14: Bus-stands and railway stations in this IT city wore a deserted look on Saturday and malls, cinemas, pubs and night clubs remained shut as part of the lockdown announced by the state government following the country's first coronavirus fatality reported from Karnataka on March 12.

Six people in Karnataka have contracted the virus including the 76-year-old man who died due to this disease from Kalaburagi in the state.

A day after chief minister B S Yediyurappa announced the shutdown for a week, the usual rush at the Central bus-stand was missing.

"Since yesterday there is slackness. Today again we are witnessing the same," a Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation official told PTI.

The Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation, which runs inter-city and inter-state buses, too has seen a decline in its revenue.

"For the past five to six days we are seeing a drop of Rs 32 lakh to Rs 35 lakh in our daily revenue of Rs eight crore," Bengaluru divisional controller B T Prabhakar Reddy said.

On March 13, Yediyurappa issued instructions to stop all kinds of exhibitions, summer camps, conferences, fairs, marriage, sports and engagement events and birthday parties state-wide for a week from Saturday.

Business at pubs and aars have taken a hit due to the virus threat.

"Our businesses have suffered somewhere between 40 per cent and 70 per cent.

It is very difficult to cope with the situation," said Manu Chandra, Bengaluru chapter head of National Restaurant Association of India.

In Chitradurga district, the annual Rathayatra was cancelled whereas in Bengaluru, a temple displayed a board that it will not distribute any 'teertha' (holy water) or 'prasad' (offering) to devotees in view of the coronavirus scare.