Archives for May 2021

BENGALURU : Over 55 lakh farmers across Karnataka received Rs 985.61 crore directly into their bank accounts under the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi  (PM-KISAN) scheme on Friday. “Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the 8th instalment of financial benefit under PM-KISAN.

The PM-KISAN scheme was implemented in Karnataka from February 1, 2019. From March 2019 to March 2021, 55.06 lakh farmers received a financial assistance of Rs 6,936 crore from the Centre,  a statement issued by the government stated. Under the scheme, Rs 6,000 is givien to farmers in three installments of Rs 2,000 each.

The state government provides an additional Rs 4,000 as financial assistance to farmers, given in two installments of Rs 2,000 each.  The state government has provided Rs 2891.70 crore to farmers under the scheme so far. Karnataka has done the highest percentage of Aadhaar enabled transactions under the scheme, the statement said.

On Friday, the PM released over 19,000 crore to over 9.5 crore farmers in different states. Under the scheme Rs 1.15 lakh crore has been released to farmers till date, the statement added.

BENGALURU: Hospitals and medical centres across Karnataka are consuming a little over 800 metric tonnes of medical oxygen daily while the requirement is about 1,700 MT. The acute shortfall is to the extent of 850-900 MT daily, requiring immediate supply of at least 1,200 MT of medical oxygen to prevent any catastrophe like the Chamarajanagar hospital tragedy.

The shortfall on May 9 was 874 metric tonnes (1 kilo litre of oxygen is 1.1417 metric tonne) to reach the consumption requirement of 1,700 MT daily, and it continues daily in that range, he pointed out.

The data collected manually from each deputy commissioner and zone, does not fluctuate much on a daily basis. The highest consumption is in Bengaluru Urban at about 296 KL on May 6 and May 9 each. This is followed by Mysuru with usage of about 49 KL on May 9, Dharwad with 45 KL, Belagavi 28.5 KL, Ballari 27 KL, Bagalkot and Vijayapura with 25 KL each.

In some districts such as Ballari, Bengaluru Rural, Chikkamagaluru, Kalaburagi, Raichur, Ramanagara, Tumakuru, Udupi and Yadgir, the consumption reduced on May 9 from what was used on May 6. Moudgil attributed this decrease to oxygen audit being done by districts and all Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike zone nodal officers for each and every hospital.

“We have put in place an elaborate system with every district and BBMP zone having dedicated oxygen nodal officers and camp officers who camp full time at the 57 refilling stations and manufacturers’ units. Information is obtained from each hospital, and once a week, an oxygen audit of each and every hospital in the state is done. So far, two rounds have been completed,” Moudgil said.

Daily monitoring of oxygen consumption of each district, BBMP zones and hospitals is done and buffer oxygen stocks are being created to handle unforeseen shortages.

Oxygen plant s have stopped filling cylinders individually brought by people following government orders. This has become a challenge for COVID-19 patients who need oxygen. “On one hand, there are COVID-19 patients who need a cylinder for the next 8 to 12 hours until they find a bed. On the other hand, hospitals are forcing patients into early discharge due to scarcity of beds and advise continuing medication at home along with oxygen support. These people run for cylinders, which plants are not refilling anymore,” said Sabeel Nazir, trustee, Naasih Foundation.

Hospitals entertain patients’ families for 1-2 days, giving a letter on the letterhead, which can be shown at the refilling stations for oxygen. However, they do not do it every day, leaving the patients in a lurch. “NGOs like ours running oxygen banks are not given oxygen supply. After the Chamarajanagar incident, they prioritise refills only for patients in hospital,” Nazir added.

Pramesh Jain

The Jeeevanbhimanagar police have registered FIR against six staffer including duty doctor and patient coordinator of Manipal hospital charging them under negligence which led to the death of a covid patient.

The accused has been identified  as,Muskan,patient,co-ordinator,Dr.Sudha,Sanjay,Nurse,Smt.Hanna,in-charge nurse,Vinayaka Murthy, billing coordinator and Roy Mendons,staff of the Manipal hospital  .

Senior officer said,East Nodal officers incharge of Private Hospitals headed by ADGP KSRP,Alok Kumar along with,IAS,Captain Manivannan,BWSSB,EE,Ravindra Kumar and team visited Manipal hospital after receiving complaint by patient relative about the medical negligence showed by the hospital staff which led to a Covid patient death.

The team visited the hospital and conducted a Inquiry regarding the allegations made by the kin of deceased the team after collecting information about the deceased patient found a medical negligence done by hospital staff and patient coordinator and duty doctor.

A complaint was filed by EE, Ravindra Kumar of BWSSB the Jeeevanbhimanagar police on Tuesday registered an FIR against Muskan, patient coordinator,Dr.Sudha,Sanjay,Nurse, Hanna,in-charge nurse,Vinayaka Murthy,billing coordinator and Roy Mendons,staff of the Manipal hospital.

Mr.Kumar said that a patient by name Sudha was referred by BBMP for admission for Covid19 treatment on April 29.

The patient was brought in the ambulance and admitted in the emergency ward.After providing treatment the hospital discharged the patient the next day.

The family took the patient back home and two days later the patient succumbed due to non availability of treatment .

Though she was allotted bed from the BBMP, the staff concerned discharged her without giving proper treatment leading to their suspicious behaviour and hence needed a detailed investigations in the case to ascertain what led to the death of patient and what made them to discharge the patient next day only a detailed investigation will be done in the case he added.

ADGP KSRP,Alok Kumar,reacted by tweeting from his official Twitter handle,Quest for justice for the  hapless Covid victim.After admission at the hospital,she was turned away within two hours and died at home after two days due to Covid.FIR  registered for death due to negligence against staff,including one doctor.Need to stop such incidents Alok Kumar said in his tweet.

Parmesh jain

The West Division police of Upparpet police busted a fake RT-PCR certificate racket and arrested a 35-year-old travel agent who was selling fake covid negative certificates which are mandatory for the people to travel to other states as per the travel guidelines issued by the state government .

The accused has been identified as, Sampathlal,35,Resident of Manavarthipet.

DCP West,Dr Sanjeev M Patil,told Media persons on Wednesday our upparpet police inspector received a credible information that one person is selling fake RT-PCR certificate near chickpet BBMP grounds and is charging around 3000-4000 for each from people to travel to other states.

Based on a tip off,a team of police led by Inspector CB Shivaswamy and swung into action and rushed to the spot and kept a close watch on the suspect and the team after getting confirmation that he is indulged in selling fake RT-PCR Covid negative certificate racket.

The police team apprehended him and took him to station for further questioning during questioning he said that he works as a travel agent in manavarthipet area the team escorted him to his shop and conducted a search and during search the team recovered a letter head of a private Diagnostics centre and three covid negative certificates duly signed by the doctors in the name of three persons were recovered.

During investigation the accused confessed the crime and it was found that the accused was working as a travel agent to get railway and air tickets for his customers.

After travelling restrictions he resorted to creating fake certificates by creating fake letter heads of private Diagnostics centre in the name of fake doctors and duly signed to make extra money from his clients.

Investigations revealed that the accused was charging RS.3000 to Rs 4000 per each certificate.

Inspector and team grilled him a detailed investigation by the team the accused spilled the beans and it has revealed that he has managed to create several certificates using which people have gone to Rajasthan and West Bengal where a Covid negative certificate is mandatory.

We have seized his phone and gathered the data of the people who got the certificates from him. We will be alerting the Rajasthan and West Bengal counterparts to identify them and take further action.

Sampath Lal has been taken into custody to ascertain if there is a possible role of doctor or a diagnostic centre.

The Upparpet Police have booked the accused under Disaster management act and also under fraud,forgery,unlawful and negligent act to spread infection and also under cheating.

The police are also on the lookout for Mukesh Paramar,associate of Sampath Lal who is presently on the run and will be nabbed soon and  further investigation is on.

The racket was catering to people who wanted negative reports to fulfil conditions for travel and work,but did not want to take a test or wait for the report.Several such rackets have been busted across the country in the past two months.We are checking if there are more such rackets operating in the city.

Finally Bengaluru Police Commissioner,Kamal Pant has appreciated Addl CP West,Soumendhu Mukherjee,DCP West,Dr Sanjeev M Patil,ACP,P Ravikumar,PI,CB Shivaswamy,PSI, Umesh,Narayan,and crime staff as,Mahadev,Mahadevaswamy and other staff who has successfully nabbed the travel agent for creating fake RT-PCR Covid certificate and a suitable reward will be given to the team for the exemplary and commendable job done by them he added.

BENGALURU: The State Government has decided to temporarily suspend vaccination for the 18-44 age group from May 14 until further notice. Vaccinations will not be given even to those who have already booked appointments. The order is applicable only for Covid-19 vaccination being administered at all government vaccination centers in the state.This comes just a day after the state, which is facing a severe shortage of vaccines, decided to float a global tender to procure two crore doses and facilitate vaccination of those in the 18-44-year age group.

Earlier in the evening, the Karnataka Government decided to design its own website as an alternative, as many citizens were finding it difficult to book slots for Covid-19 vaccination on the Union Government’s CoWIN portal.When vaxxing for 18+ resumes, the website will function as a registration, tracking and information portal on the vaccination drive for those aged between 18 and 44, the age group for which the state is procuring vaccinations directly from vaccine manufacturers. 

The website will also be designed to address concerns regarding geographical shifting and stop people from one locality registering for vaccines in another locality, city or town. The details of the website’s programming and contents were discussed at a meeting of CM B S Yediyurappa, his cabinet colleagues and officials on Wednesday evening.“The CoWIN app is creating a lot of confusion due to non-availability of slots, heavy traffic, glitches in OTP and registration process. It allows anybody to register for vaccination in any place, irrespective of where they are registering from. This is leading to those in cities going to other towns and districts to get vaccines, ultimately depriving citizens of those localities of vaccines. The Karnataka government’s website is set to be up and running, at least in the beta version, by next week,” said a source who was part of Wednesday’s meeting.

The website will be limited to citizens aged between 18 and 44 since the CoWIN portal has been catering largely to those above the age of 45. An IAS officer is likely to be appointed to supervise the designing of the website as well as its functioning, once it goes public. Glitches will be fixed as and when found, sources said.To address the concern of those without internet connections or smartphones/computers missing out on registration for vaccines, the CM is said to have asked for ward-wise registration counters. With many raising concerns about the poor and vulnerable losing out on vaccine registration due to lack of access to internet, the government is mulling setting up ward-wise counters similar to how fever clinics, temporary testing counters and camps were set up earlier.“Those who do not know how to register can visit these camps, verify identity and get registered,” a source said.

BENGALURU: While the head of the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), Dr Balram Bhargava, has cautioned that districts reporting positivity rates of over 10 per cent should remain locked down for another six to eight weeks, 29 of Karnataka’s 31 districts have reported much higher positivity rates. 

Dr Giridhara R Babu, senior epidemiologist and member of Covid-19 Techincal Advisory Committee, warned, “The infection rate in districts can only be controlled with increase in testing and ensuring that the lockdown norms are strictly followed. “Otherwise, the number of cases will rise much higher and the mortality rates too may increase drastically.” 

Given the situation, some districts like Uttara Kannada, Chamarajanagar, Shivamogga, Ballari and Davanagere have implemented strict lockdown only from Tuesday with banning of weddings and religious programmes. However, in many villages, especially in Tumakuru district which has a positivity rate of 38.1 pc, weddings are being solemnised in local temples and markets are open in the mornings. In some places in Belagavi district too, there are crowds in local markets during mornings.

This at a time when most of these districts are facing shortage of oxygenated and ICU beds, and there is no proper monitoring of patients in home isolation. People thronging hospitals for vaccination too has led to an increase in number of cases. “Belagavi has severe shortage of oxygen beds. The 400 oxygenated bed designated for Covid patients in Hassan are full. In Tumakuru, there is a limited number of ICUs and the district designated hospital has not expanded the ICUs, CT machines are out of order. Such problems create major hindrance in terms of managing the situation.” sources said.