Bommai leaves for Delhi to consult BJP leadership on cabinet expansion
Bengaluru, Aug 1: Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai left for Delhi on Sunday to hold consultations with the BJP central leadership on expansion of his cabinet.
"Most probably there is a meeting tomorrow. I will meet our party president J P Nadda," Bommai told reporters before leaving for the national capital by a flight.
Earlier in the day, he said the cabinet expansion exercise may not take a week's time and a direction from the leadership was likely by Monday.
Bommai took oath as the Chief Minister on July 28 after the resignation of his predecessor B S Yediyurappa on July 26.
He is the lone Cabinet member in the government.
Meanwhile, many ministerial aspirants called on Bommai and raised the pitch for a cabinet berth.
Former agriculture minister B C Patil, who met Bommai, maintained that his meeting was related to an irrigation project in his constituency.
Asked whether he spoke to the CM about a ministerial berth, he said, "The CM is aware of it. He has already spoken about it (cabinet expansion) to the media that he will do it at the earliest. So I did not discuss with him on this issue."
Patil also took exception to terms like 'outsiders' and 'Bombay Boys' used to describe the 17 MLAs,who broke away from Congress and the JD(S) to topple the coalition government led by H D Kumaraswamy in 2019, were disqualified from the Assembly and later joined the BJP.
Of them, a majority of MLAs won the bypolls and 11 were made Ministers.
Those who quit Congress and the JD(S) have been demanding a ministerial berth, saying their 'sacrifice' in 2019 had helped install the BJP government in Karnataka.
Besides Patil, Murugesh Nirani, Shivanagouda Naik, Mahesh Kumathalli, K G Bopaiah, Dr C N Ashwath Narayan and V Somanna were among those who called on the Chief Minister on Sunday, party sources said.
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ISRO launches Mission MITRA for safety of human spaceflight mission crew
Bengaluru (PTI): ISRO on Friday said it has undertaken mission MITRA in Leh, Union Territory of Ladakh, from April 2 to 9, a first-of-its-kind team behavioural study for the benefit of human spaceflight missions such as Gaganyaan.
The mission, inaugurated by the ISRO chairman V Narayanan, was mainly for the crew safety and performance.
"Mission MITRA is a first-of-its-kind team behavioural study designed by ISRO and IAF-Institute of Aerospace Medicine to examine the physiological, psychological, and operational dynamics of Crew and ground teams functioning in a high-altitude environment," ISRO said in a statement.
This study is targeted to generate vital understanding on the team interoperability between crew (Gaganyatris) and ground control teams and the effectiveness of decision making under environmental & operational stress, the space agency said.
Noting that the crew safety and performance are the most critical elements of all Human Spaceflight Missions, ISRO said the ability of the crew to communicate effectively, adapt to stress, maintain psychological resilience and support one another determines the success and safety of any mission.
Analogue missions conducted under controlled yet realistic conditions are utilised to understand how crews perform under challenging conditions, it added.
The space agency said the high altitude of approximately 3,500 meters at Leh having the environmental conditions of hypoxia, low temperature, and isolation, is a natural analogue for spaceflight operations.
