Indian govt changes its mind: Passports to retain address page; Orange plan dropped

Ballari, Jan 13: Police on Monday arrested more than 30 Congress activists, including Congress MLA B Z Zameer Ahmad, who were on the way to Ballari to stage a dharna in front of MLA G Somashekhar Reddy's residence after he delivered hate speech during a pro-CAA demonstration a week ago.

Ballari Superintendent of Police SP C K Baba said that Congress MLA B Z Zameer Ahmed has not been granted permission to stage a dharna in front of the Bellary MLA’s residence.

Zameer Ahmed had asked the police to arrest Mr Reddy after he delivered a provocative speech or he will stage a dharna in front of the later's house.

SP said, “Investigations into the complaints pertaining to the provocative speech by Bellary City MLA G Somashekar Reddy is underway. In-charge Dy SP Maheshwara Gouda has taken statements of the complainants and others related to the case. A charge sheet on the same will be submitted to the court soon."

Reddy has been booked for making a provocative speech during a pro-CAA protest here in Ballari last week in which he said that Hindus outnumbered Muslims.

Following the incident police provided high police security to the MLA house and sensitive area in the city.

Bengaluru, Feb 10: Senior Congress leader DK Shivakumar on Sunday hit out at the BJP and RSS for taking out a route march in Ramanagara against the controversial Jesus Christ statue.

“Just because the BJP won 25 seats in the Lok Sabha polls, Congress workers need not lose hope. If the Congress and JD(S) had worked out a better strategy, the BJP would not have won even 10 seats. We will correct our mistakes,” the former Congress minister said.

After the Lok Sabha polls, the BJP has failed to do well in assembly polls and has been losing power in many states. People are hitting the streets protesting against its policies such as CAA and NRC, he said.

Accusing the BJP and RSS of not being able to digest Congress’ victory in the Bengaluru Rural Lok Sabha segment in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, he said that the BJP is trying hard to make inroads into the constituency represented by his brother D K Suresh. “Let them take out route march, we don’t care,” he said.

“We all know what the BJP did during the Lok Sabha elections, and the media reported how much money they spent in the elections. What was the Election Commission doing? Was the Income Tax Department sitting with its eyes closed? Why did they conduct raids only in Hassan, Shivamogga and Mandya districts,” he asked.

He alleged that false cases were slapped when him and other leaders, including H D Kumaraswamy, Siddaramaiah, G Parameshwara and Dinesh Gundurao.

Udupi, July 1: In a concerning development, another SSLC student in Udupi district has tested positive for covid-19.

With this the number of covid-19 patients among SSLC students in the coastal district rose to three. All of them are girls.

The fresh case has been reported from Byndoor. She has already written three papers.

She had reportedly developed some of the symptoms and hence her throat swabs were sent for testing on June 30. Today she received positive report, sources said.