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Veteran actor and playwright, Girish Karnad Dies At 81

News Network
June 10, 2019

Bengaluru, Jun 10: Jnanpith award winning playwright, actor and director Girish Karnad died at his residence in Bengaluru early Monday morning, aged 81.

Karnad was a prominent playwright for four decades, often using history and mythology to tackle contemporary issues. His plays have been translated into English and several Indian languages and directed by directors like Ebrahim Alkazi, BV Karanth, Alyque Padamsee, Prasanna, Arvind Gaur, Satyadev Dubey, Vijaya Mehta, Shyamanand Jalan, Amal Allana and Zafer Mohiuddin.

He was conferred the Padma Shri and Padma Bhushan by the Government of India and has won four Filmfare Awards, of which three are Filmfare Award for Best Director – Kannada and the fourth a Filmfare Best Screenplay Award.

Karnad was born Girish Raghunath Karnad in Matheran, in present-day Maharashtra, in 1938. After working at the Oxford University Press, Kolkata, he decided to become a full-time writer.

Karnad made his acting as well as screenwriting debut in the Kannada movie, Samskara (1970), based on a novel by UR Ananthamurthy and directed by Pattabhirama Reddy. The film won the President’s Golden Lotus Award for Kannada cinema.

In television, he played the role of Swami’s father in the TV series Malgudi Days (1986–1987), based on RK Narayan’s books. He also hosted the science magazine Turning Point on Doordarshan, in the early 1990s.

He made his directorial debut with Vamsha Vriksha (1971), based on a Kannada novel by SL Bhyrappa. It won him National Film Award for Best Direction along with BV Karanth, who co-directed the film. Later, Karnad directed several movies in Kannada and Hindi, including Godhuli (1977) and Utsav (1984).

He has several documentaries, on the Kannada poet DR Bendre (1972), Kanaka-Purandara (English, 1988) on two medieval Bhakti poets of Karnataka, Kanaka Dasa and Purandara Dasa, and The Lamp in the Niche (English, 1989) on Sufism and the Bhakti movement.

He served as director of the Film and Television Institute of India (1974–1975) and chairman of the Sangeet Natak Akademi, the National Academy of the Performing Arts (1988–93).

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News Network
February 27,2020

Bengaluru, Feb 27: Union Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan on Wednesday said the Union Government will take up the issue of establishing a US consulate in Bengaluru during bilateral talks with the US officials in the future.

Speaking at a seminar on Videsh Sampark here, Mr Muraleedharan said after Delhi and Mumbai, a large number of visa applications come from Bengaluru. “We will take up the issue of establishing a US consulate in Bengaluru during bilateral talks,” he said.

Earlier, the chief secretary of Karnataka TM Vijay Bhaskar urged the centre to consider the state government’s demand of setting up a US Consulate in Bengaluru. At the moment visa applicants have to travel to Chennai for the purpose.

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News Network
May 28,2020

Bengaluru, May 28: A thousand government schools in Karnataka are set to get Englishmedium sections from this academic year (2020-21). These institutions will function in both English and Kannada medium.

The decision was taken by primary and secondary education minister S Suresh Kumar and officials of the education department at a meeting on Wednesday.

Suresh Kumar said dualmedium will help improve the standard of schools and enable their development. The poorest of the poor spend almost 40% of their income on their children’s education in private schools. With the introduction of dual-medium, the government hopes such families will be able to save their earnings, he said. These schools will impart lessons in both English and Kannada. They will also provide textbooks in both languages.

‘Kannada must for all’

The meeting reviewed implementation of the compulsory Kannada Language Learning Act, 2015. Officials from the Kannada Development Authority were present at the meeting who claimed that some private schools have failed to implement the Act properly.

“Action will be taken against such institutions. Every child studying in schools across the state must learn Kannada,” Kumar said at the meeting.

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coastaldigest.com news network
May 27,2020

Mangaluru, May 27: Karnataka’s twin coastal districts of Dakshina Kannada and Udupi today reported 11 and 9 fresh covid-19 cases respectively.

In Dakshina Kannada the covid-19 patients include seven women and four men who had recently come from Maharashtra.

One of the patients is a 3-year-old child. Others are girls aged 11 and 17, women aged 36, 37, 45, 59 and men aged 22, 35, 39 and 46.

All of them have been shifted to covid-19 hospital from different institutional quarantine centres. 

In Udupi too all the nine people – six men, a boy, and two women -  had come from Maharashtra a few days ago.

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