CM Bommai to table K'taka budget on Feb 17
Bengaluru, Jan 20: The budget session of the Karnataka legislature would start on February 10 and Chief Minister Basvaraj Bommai would table the budget on February 17, State Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister J C Madhuswamy said on Friday.
"It has been decided to conduct the budget session from February 10 with an address by Governor Thaawarchand Gehlot and the Chief Minister will table the budget on February 17. The business advisory committee will decide on the duration of the session," Madhuswamy briefed reporters after the Cabinet meeting.
The Cabinet decided also to regularise quarrying for those who are into manual mining and mistakenly carry out their activities in different areas.
The government decided to increase the cess from sugar producers.
The cess for factories with 2,500 tonne of Cane per Day (TCD) capacity has been increased from existing Rs 10,000 to Rs 50,000.
Factories having capacity between 2,500 TCD and 5,000 TCD, the cess has been increased from Rs 15,000 to Rs one lakh and, the factories above 5,000 TCDs, which have been paying a cess of Rs 25,000 has been increased to Rs 1.5 lakh.
Those factories above 15,000 TCD capacity would pay a cess of Rs two lakh.
"The existing cess was prevalent for the past 30 to 40 years due to which we were facing difficulty to run the institution. So we increased the cess," Madhuswamy said.
The decision to increase cess was taken to continue the operations of S Nijalingappa Sugar Institute for the research and development works in sugar and sugarcane, the Minister explained.
The Cabinet decided also to provide a shared capital of Rs 54.6 crore to the Karnataka State Finance Commission (KSFC), Madhuswamy said.
It also decided to extend the one-time settlement of the loans pending towards the KSFC after 2003, he added.
The benefit of one-time settlement was restricted only to those loans taken before October 31, 2003.
According to Madhuswamy, the KSFC has a due to the tune of Rs 345 crore from the defaulters comprising of 127.4 crore principal amount and Rs 217.6 crore interest.
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Traffic fraud: Fake 'no-entry' sticker racket busted in Delhi, mastermind among 3 held
New Delhi (PTI): Police here have busted a crime syndicate involved in traffic fraud and extortion, arresting three people including the alleged mastermind who sold fake stickers to help commercial vehicles bypass no-entry restrictions, an official said on Saturday.
The police said they dismantled a third organised syndicate linked to traffic-related frauds, with the arrest of Rinku Rana alias Bhushan, his associate Sonu Sharma and Mukesh Kumar alias Pakodi, who was also connected to another extortion syndicate.
According to the police, Rinku Rana was running a well-organised network that facilitated the movement of commercial goods vehicles during restricted hours by selling fake 'marka' or stickers for Rs 2,000 to Rs 5,000 per vehicle every month. The stickers were falsely projected as authorisation to evade traffic challans.
During raids, the police recovered Rs 31 lakh in cash, property documents worth several crores of rupees, over 500 fake stickers and six mobile phones allegedly used to operate the syndicate.
The crackdown followed a complaint filed by a traffic police officer in April this year after a commercial vehicle tried to evade checking by producing a fake sticker claiming exemption from enforcement action.
Investigation revealed that social media groups were being used to coordinate the illegal movement of vehicles and alert drivers about traffic police checkpoints, police said.
"A parallel system was being run to cheat drivers and vehicle owners while undermining traffic enforcement. On the basis of evidence, provisions related to organised crime under the BNS were invoked," a senior police officer said.
Sonu Sharma, the police said, managed social media groups through which stickers were sold and real-time alerts were circulated regarding traffic police movement. He also acted as a link between Rana and drivers operating in the field.
In a related development, Mukesh Kumar alias Pakodi, an associate of Rajkumar alias Raju Meena, who was earlier arrested under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA), was also apprehended.
Mukesh allegedly helped extort money from transporters and was involved in blackmailing traffic police personnel by recording enforcement actions, the police said.
Investigators alleged the syndicate led by Rajkumar deployed drivers to deliberately violate traffic rules and secretly record police officials during challans, later using manipulated videos to extort money under threat of false allegations.
The police said that in total, eight accused belonging to three different organised crime syndicates linked to traffic frauds and extortion have been arrested so far.
Further investigation is underway to trace the remaining members, conduct financial probes, and analyse digital evidence recovered during the raids, officials added.
