Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu and Union Minister for Civil Aviation K. Ram Mohan Naidu during their flight in the seaplane from Prakasam Barrage in Vijayawada to Srisailam in Nandyal district on Saturday.
| Photo Credit: PTI

Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu has said the government will develop tourism in the Nallamala forest region even while preserving and protecting the wildlife in it.

Interacting with the media near the Patalaganga at Srisailam after offering prayers at the Sri Bhramaramba Mallikarjuna Swamy temple on November 9, 2024, Mr. Naidu said a committee comprising three Cabinet Ministers would be constituted to prepare the master plan for developing Srisailam.

Pleasant experience

Mr. Naidu, along with Union Civil Aviation Minister K Ram Mohan Naidu and State Tourism Minister Kandula Durgesh, travelled in the demo seaplane from Vijayawada to Srisailam, where he reviewed the development of tourism sector in the temple town and Nallamala forest area.

Mr. Naidu said he reached the famous Jyothirlinga shrine from Vijayawada in 40 minutes, and the flight was a pleasant experience as it passed through the dense forest area. It was more pleasant than the normal flight journey, as there was no turbulence and even the landing was smooth, Mr. Naidu said.

Tiger safari

Srisailam was being developed as a pilgrim shrine and there was a need to promote tourism, he said. “There is a need to develop a tiger safari at Tummalabailu, as the Nallamala forest is a habitat to tigers, leopards and other wild animals. This will attract a good number of tourists,” he said.

“Srisailam has several tourism attractions such as Akkamahadevi caves and museum, apart from famous places of worship such as Istakameswari temple, Chenchu Lakshmi temple and Sakshi Ganapati temple. In 2014-15, our government had spent ₹47 crore and turned Srisailam into a spiritual centre, and widened roads to facilitate smooth journey of the temple chariot, constructed a ring road and a ropeway. But, there has been no development in the last five years,”‘ Mr. Naidu said.

He said said the jungle and tiger safaris at Tummalabhailu and Rollamadugu would further enhance the tourism potential of Srisailam. He said a committee would be constituted with Ministers K. Pawan Kalyan (Forests and Environment), Anam Ramnarayana Reddy (Endowments) and Kandula Durgesh (Tourism) to chalk out the master plan.

“We will get the committee report at the earliest and go ahead with the development plan,”‘ he said, adding the government would also seek the support of the Union government in developing the temple town. Apart from this, the government would make efforts to make Sunnipenta a suitable place for stay on the lines of Tirupati.

Development of Gandikota

Mr. Naidu said the government would develop Gandikota in Kadapa district and provide adventure sports there to attract tourists. He said the seaplane operations would start from March, and the State would be made a tourist destination in the days to come.

Mr. Naidu said he had grand plans to turn Rayalaseema into ‘Ratanala Seema’, and for that maintaining law and order was crucial.

“Some evil forces are using the social media for their political gain. We will not tolerate if anybody resorts to character assassination of women and children. We will act tough even if there are derogatory and objectionable posts against the family members of the YSRCP leaders,” he warned.

Tension prevailed in Bidaruru village in Arakalgud taluk on Saturday following a few miscreants allegedly desecrating a portrait of B.R. Ambedkar, the architect of the Indian Constitution.

The residents of the village noticed the portrait, placed near the bus stand, desecrated on Saturday morning. The incident is said to have happened Friday night.

Bahujan Samaj Party leader Athni Harish and his supporters staged a protest in the village demanding action against the people who desecrated the portrait. They said the police should arrest the accused immediately.

Senior police officers visited the village and convinced the protesters to withdraw promising them action against the accused.

The Konanur police have registered the case.

These vendors have been here for generations. Many of these vendors do not have dustbins near their stalls and ask the buyers to look for dustbins and dispose the waste. 
| Photo Credit: File Photo

“Every morning, when we come to Lalbagh for our walk, we find leftover food and wrappers, soft drink bottles and other litter lying around. These are left by the people who buy things from hawkers inside but refuse to put the waste in the bins. The waste collection only starts from 9.30 a.m. onwards,” said P. Sadashiva, president, Lalbagh Walkers Association. 

Although plastic is completely banned on the premises of Lalbagh Botanical Garden, littering of other materials goes on despite the reported efforts of vendors to keep it contained to dustbins. Around the famous rock structure in Lalbagh are scores of vendors who have their business set up on tables. They sell flavoured milk, soft drinks, cucumbers, corn, raw mangoes among other things. There are also ice cream carts spread across the garden. 

These vendors have been here for generations. Many of these vendors do not have dustbins near their stalls and ask the buyers to look for dustbins and dispose the waste. This invariably leads to littering.

“We have strict instructions to not sell anything plastic. So, we do not do that. We use biodegradable materials, and we always ask buyers to look for a dustbin and dispose of it. While the visitors from foreign countries always throw them in bins, our people fail to do it and thus litter the place,” said Shanthamma (name changed), a vendor in Lalbagh. 

A similar litter problem exists in Cubbon Park too. Here hawkers are not allowed inside but are allowed to set up shop outside the gates. “In Cubbon Park, people are allowed to bring their own food or from the vendors outside and eat it inside. Unfortunately, most of them never throw the waste in the bins. When we come in after public holidays especially, we can see a lot of waste around, including plastic water bottles. There are also coffee and tea vendors who sell them in wax coated cups which are again thrown around the park,” said Sunita Kumar from Cubbon Park Conservation Committee. 

She added, “Another problem is that of diapers. Parents do not go to washrooms but end up changing diapers in the park and throwing them away behind trees or in corners. We also see these balloons which are up on the trees which are almost as dangerous as manja to birds.”  

The Horticulture Department denies that there is any littering inside both the lung spaces. “In Lalbagh, they have their fixed places near the rock, and they do not come anywhere else. In Cubbon Park, we have no hawkers at all. Even if there is some littering, our teams are constantly on the ground cleaning the park. The citizens should also become more aware and use dustbins,” said D.S. Ramesh, director, Horticulture Department. 

Even though the officials claim that the hawkers are only restricted to one place in Lalbagh, long term hawkers there said that the newer ones are found near the lake and scattered at some other places. Visitors too admit that they are sometimes heckled by these vendors. 

Visitors say that a designated vending zone in Lalbagh might help keep all the businesses contained in one place and possibly help stop littering. “We do not want to move away from here (near the rock) as people are used to buying from us here. A more organised set up could help us with security. In the nights, when we leave our stock here and go, a lot of it is stolen sometimes by residents of neighbouring areas who bully the security guards and come in,” Ms. Shanthamma added.  

In the failing monsoons of 2023-24, the State had a record peak demand (over 17,000 Megawatts) and faced a power crunch for over a month.
| Photo Credit: File Photo

Between the financial year (FY) 2022-23, overall energy sales in Karnataka went up by 22.7%, the highest growth over a decade. Based on previous sales, consumption and other drivers the peak demand in the State is expected to cross 33,000 Megwatts (MW) by 2034-35, according to a report titled ‘Resource Adequacy of Karnataka’ submitted by the Power Corporation of Karnataka Limited (PCKL) to the State government recently.  

With monsoons failing 2023-24, the State had a record peak demand (over 17,000 Megawatts) and faced a power crunch for over a month. The officials from the Energy Department attribute this to be one of the reasons for a growth in energy sales in 2023-24.

“There were two reasons why our sales went up in 2023-24 – one was economic recovery after the COVID-19 pandemic and the other was due to the low rainfall which led to increased consumption. The electricity demand for irrigation pump sets and other devices went up. When compared to the previous year, this year (2024-25) we might not see as much growth in sales as there has been good rainfall,” Gaurav Gupta, Additional Chief Secretary, Energy Department, told The Hindu. 

With such unpredictable patterns, the Energy Department decided to conduct a resource assessment. The report was prepared by Power Research and Development Consultants Pvt. Ltd., a consulting firm and was accepted by the State government on October 16. 

The report considered the impact of open access, distributed energy resources, demand response, Electric Vehicles (EV), tariff signals, specific energy consumption, energy efficiency measures and impact of econometric parameters to create demand projections. The report also subtracts solar rooftop generated power, whose capacity is projected to touch 1,468 MW by 2034-35, from the total energy sales. The long-term forecasting study for the State has been performed for three agricultural scenarios – average rainfall, high rainfall and low rainfall. 

Based on the average rainfall scenario, the peak demand for the ongoing year (2024-25) has been projected at 16,271 MW. The numbers are expected to gradually increase by 2034-35 to 33,310 MW. The penetration of EVs is expected to be one of the major drivers of demand in the State. The projections show that the energy consumption of EVs will jump from 638 Million Units (MU) in 2024-25 to 22,705 MU in 2034-35. 

“In terms of power availability, one should always keep a margin of 20%-30%. After last year, we have realised that for a poor monsoon year, we need to have a higher power reserve. This report will help us take up resource adequacy measures in the coming years with regard to how we equip our generation and transmission systems. We are anyway geared up for it now,” Mr. Gupta said about the intent behind the report.  

Recommendations 

Among the many recommendations given by the report addition of capacity is one of the major ones. It recommends that along with a firm capacity or thermal equivalent of 8,496 MW proposed by PCKL, 1,970 MW proposed by KPCL and an additional 3,000 MW should be contracted over the next 11 years. The report also stresses the addition of Renewable Energy Capacity and energy storage.

The report will now be submitted to the Central Electricity Authority for validation and then to the Karnataka Electricity Regulatory Commission (KERC) for approval.  

The railway passengers associations have requested to extend the Madurai-Punalur night express train service to Nagapattinam or Karaikal to provide better access to the ferry service from Nagapattinam to Sri Lanka.

Passengers from the southern districts of Kerala and Tamil Nadu are showing growing interest in traveing on this ferry from Nagapattinam. At present, there is no direct train between Nagapattinam and southern districts. To address this issue, the passengers associations have urged the railways to extend the Madurai-Punalur train to Nagapattinam or Karaikal.

Office-bearers of the Southern Districts Passengers Association pointed out that only two stations — Tiruchi and Villupuram — had maintenance facilities in the Tiruchi division. Extending train service may pose challenges in maintenance. Therefore, they suggested that the train be extended to Nagapattinam or Karaikkal for three days a week, with the remaining four days of service extended to Tiruchi where maintenance could be carried out.

The High Court of Karnataka has summoned the service records and details of all the criminal cases filed by Seema H., an Assistant Conservator of Forests (ACF), after taking note of the allegation that she had changed the name and religion of her father and claimed that she belonged to Hindu-Adi Karnataka community, a Scheduled Caste (SC).

She has also filed several cases against many, including some by invoking the provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.

The court passed the order on a petition filed by Pradeepkumar, a city-based advocate, who had questioned the registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against him by Vidhana Soudha police on the complaint by Ms. Seema.

“Whether the complainant [Ms. Seema] has secured employment contending that she is the one belonging to Scheduled Caste or not, is a matter which requires to be noticed and considered by the State,” Justice M. Nagaprasanna observed in the order while asking the authorities to submit her service records.

The complaint

She had lodged a complaint of forgery against the petitioner-advocate, her father, and another person on October 10, 2024, in connection with a letter written in her name to the head of the Forest Department by allegedly forging her signature, in which complaint of harassment was made against her immediate superior officer.

She had also alleged in the complaint that her father, who is a retired employee of the Forest Department, had deserted his wife and children, and he is now trying to bring bad name to her. The petitioner-advocate and others are attempting to keep a track on her by securing records related to her under RTI Act, she had claimed.

However, it has been alleged in the petition that Ms. Seema, 38 has targeted the petitioner as he is representing one Vinod V. in a matrimonial case filed by her before a civil court in October, 2017, alleging that her husband [Vinod] has failed to fulfil her conjugal rights. The petitioner-advocate had also filed applications under RTI Act to secure her credentials like names of her parents, religion, caste, school data, service records, etc., on behalf of Mr. Vinod, who has denied having married her.

Senior Advocate D.R. Ravishankar, appearing for the petitioner, pointed out that petitioner-advocate had secured Ms. Seema’s records, including SSLC marks card under RTI Act, which discloses her father’s name as H.K.M. Harshad and mother’s name as Pyarijan and they belong to Muslim religion. Ms. Seema filed a civil suit in 2014 in which she got an ex-parte decree with a declaration that the name of her father is not ‘H.K.M. Harshad’ but it is ‘H.K. Mariswamy’ and he belong to Scheduled Caste.

In this suit, there were four defendants, all are officers of the State government, and they remain ex-parte.

Matrimonial case

Ms. Seema and Mr. Vinod, who was her senior during post-graduation, were friends, and she had claimed that she married him at a park, known as Jinkevana in Chikkamagaluru, as per Hindu rituals in August, 2017, when she was serving in Chikkamagaluru.

However, Mr. Vinod’s father lodged a complaint on August 11, 2017, that his son, who went to meet Ms. Seema, had not returned home. On his return, Mr. Vinod himself lodged a complaint on August 14, 2017, against her alleging that she took him to Chikkamagaluru on the pretext of asking him to drive her new car from showroom to the city’s outskirts but later allegedly kidnapped him.

Tirunelveli District Collector K.P. Karthikeyan on Saturday announced that hotels, old age homes, destitute homes, homes for people with disabilities and rehabilitation centres for drug de-addiction operating without registration would be sealed.

In Tirunelveli district, those running children’s home can register at District Children Welfare Office or through the website https://dsdcpimms.tn.gov.in. Operators of old age homes can register with the District Social Welfare Office or www.seniorcitizenhomes.tnsocialwelfare.tn.gov.in. Those operating hostels for women and children should register with the District Social Welfare Office or https://tnswp.com.

Homes for individuals with mental disabilities and special needs should register with the District Differently Abled Welfare Board office. Rehabilitation centers for individuals addicted to drugs and mental health facilities for people with psychiatric issues should register with the State Mental Health Authority in Chennai or on the website https://tnhealth.tn.gov.in/tngovin/dme/dme.php.

Those running homes and hostels without registration must apply for it within one month. Failure of registration will result in the sealing of the facility.

M.V.S.S. Sastry with his rich haul of certificates in Srikakulam.
| Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

A 51-year-old social activist has done over 2,500 online certificate courses within a span of two years, proving age is no bar for academic pursuits, even in fields as diverse as IT, psychology and business management.

Gandhi Mandir Committee members felicitating M.V.S.S. Sastry in Srikakulam on Saturday.
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

A member of Gandhi Mandir Committee here, M.V.S.S. Sastry completed courses and secured certificates from Google, Microsoft, Amazon, IBM, Facebook, Meta, UK Academy, University of Leads, British Council, European University, World Health Organisation, and UNICEF among others.

He did courses in skill development, business management, psychology, journalism, artificial intelligence, machine learning, and many other areas. 

It all started two years ago, when he began searching for information on cyber security to help his daughter, Gayatri, who is currently pursuing engineering first year in IIT Madras.

Mr. Sastry soon realised that many organisations were providing courses free of cost or with a small fee to enable students to improve their knowledge. He then started doing the courses one by one with the support of his academic friends who helped him to understand difficult subjects.

“In the era of competition, every student should acquire more knowledge, which is possible through certificate courses. In order to highlight this, I did these many courses,” Mr. Sastry tells The Hindu.

Gandhi Mandir Committee members Jami Bhimasankar, Konkyana Venugopal, Natukula Mohan and others have felicitated Mr. Sastry for completing the highest number of online courses, a feat recently recognised by International Book of Records, India Book of Records, India Achiever Record, and Telugu Book of Records. Mr. Sastry has applied for the Guinness World Records.

Salman Rushdie
| Photo Credit: JOE MAHER

India’s customs notification No. 405/12/88-CUS-III shook the world 36 years ago. For it banned the import of Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses. That was months before Ayatollah Khomeini’s fatwa (for blaspheming Prophet Muhammad) sent the author into hiding. 

Now the world is shaking again, this time with laughter. For no one can find that notification. It has disappeared down a bureaucratic rabbit hole, forcing the Delhi High Court to allow the import of the book. 

Loss of guilt

There’s a whole new novel awaiting Rushdie’s ironic pen (or sardonic word processor) here. If the original ban implied a loss of innocence in a country proud of its freedoms, the new twist may be a loss of guilt. Perhaps the notification was as fictitious as the characters in the novel; perhaps there are other notifications that do not exist but continue to rule our lives. 

It might not be a bad idea to check out if important ones pertaining to taxes or public behaviour actually exist. Perhaps the gentleman who set the ball rolling in the court in the Satanic Verses case can now ask why some other books are unavailable in India. These were presumed to be banned, but we can’t be sure now. Books like Stanley Wolpert’s Nine Hours to Rama, Aubrey Menen’s The Ramayana, Arthur Koestler’s The Lotus and the Robot. 

The Satanic Verses notification was issued by the Finance Ministry, and Rushdie was only one of millions who wondered why that agency should decide what the country may or may not read. When an Indian citizen went to court five years ago, asking why he could not purchase the book in India, he was directed to the customs order. And given the usual run around. 

Five years later, presumably after having searched every inch of the customs department and nearby restaurants where the officials might have eaten, it emerges that there is no such order. Either that, or someone, like a spy in a cheap novel, swallowed it to prevent it from falling into the wrong hands. Anything you say about Indian bureaucracy is usually true! 

Victory of incompetence

Yet, by this act of forgetfulness or misplacement or poor housekeeping, the bureaucracy has righted a wrong perpetrated 36 years ago. This is not so much a triumph of the freedom of expression as a victory for incompetence. That detail , however, might be lost to history decades from now. 

This wasn’t a ban on literary grounds (even if Verses isn’t one of Rushdie’s best works), but on political ones. The conditions that led to the ban can be rekindled any time by politicians: one lot who want to project themselves as leaders of the community, and another who might see in protests a diversion from the real issues. 

In his book on censorship published three decades ago, the novelist J M Coetzee made the point that “the very notion of entrusting the name of the Almighty to the protection of the law courts has taken on an increasingly anachronistic air.” If only that were true. 

The district Suchitwa Mission has come up with a detailed action plan to upgrade all offices at the Kollam civil station, including the court, to ‘clean complex’ standards. The aim is to declare all government offices as green offices on January 26, 2025, as part of the Malinya Muktham Navakeralam campaign. The action plan was presented at a meeting convened at the Kollam collectorate on Saturday. Principal District and Sessions judge G. Gopakumar inaugurated the meeting and District Collector N. Devidas presided over the function.

Since more than 1,200 government employees, 1,500 court employees and 5,000 members of the public visit the civil station complex daily, suggestions for carrying out waste disposal in a scientific manner were presented at the meeting. The proposals are to set up waste bins to collect organic and inorganic waste generated at each office, assign sanitation workers to collect and scientifically dispose of collected waste, transfer organic waste to Thumboormuzhi aerobic compost units and inorganic waste to Material Collection Facility (MCF), and collect ₹50 a month from all employees/lawyers to pay the monthly wages of the workers. A final decision will be taken after more discussions.

Other guidelines issued in the meeting, including keeping the office dust-free, avoiding use of disposable items, minimising the amount of waste, beautifying the office with eco-friendly decorative items and switching to green gifts. LSGD Joint Director Binun Wahid gave a presentation on ‘Malinya Muktham Navakeralam Campaign — Green Office’.

ADM G. Nirmal Kumar, Sub-collector Nishant Sinhara, and Corporation secretary D. Saju were present.