Fire mishap in Bengaluru Corporation office: Two persons detained
Bengaluru (PTI): Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar on Saturday said police have detained two people who had escaped after the fire mishap at the Bengaluru municipal Corporation's office, which left nine people injured.
He said the police have started investigation into the fire mishap at the Quality Control Laboratory of the civic agency on Friday.
"Police have to register a case and investigate. Two persons had fled. They have been detained. They are the (BBMP) staff. They ran away soon after the fire. They could have doused fire soon after the incident as there was safety equipment available there," Shivakumar, who holds Bengaluru Development portfolio, told reporters here.
Others on the top floor were trapped by the time they ran down the stairs.
The DCM said three inquiries were going on simultaneously – one is the departmental inquiry by the BBMP, second is police investigation and third by the Electrical Inspectorate to investigate whether the fire happened due to a short circuit.
According to him, the Quality Control Lab was not the place to store documents but it has been done.
"Whom to blame for it? The accident has already happened. We have to provide the best treatment to the injured. We will shift this lab elsewhere," he said.
The Bengaluru Central Division DCP Srinivas Gowda told reporters that a Group-D employee who was present there is being interrogated.
"We are interrogating one person who was on the ground floor at the time of incident…As I said, a Group-D employee who was there is being interrogated. Presently we have detained two people," he said.
Gowda said prima facie it appears that the fire happened due to a highly inflammable material benzene, which is used for testing the strength of asphalt.
According to him, the FSL teams and scientific officers arrived on the spot and collected proof. The incident happened days after the Congress government ordered a judicial probe into all the works in the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) during the BJP rule from 2019 to 2023.
This apart, the government formed four panels headed by IAS officers.
The nine injured have sustained burns on their faces and hands, according to Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and DCM Shivakumar.
The Congress in Karnataka drew flak for its tweet on the fire accident, which it deleted later. Minutes after the incident, the Congress in Karnataka tweeted from its official handle saying that the fire incident was not an accident but a conspiracy.
Meanwhile, BJP MLA Basanagouda Patil Yatnal tweeted that the Congress Twitter handle is just like the Congress party which runs away after making allegations.
"The unbridled inept people write whatever comes to their mind and when we question their authenticity, they delete the tweet and run away," Patil tweeted.
He also said, "Wasn’t there a nobleman who said that action will be taken against those who spread fake news? Where has he disappeared?"
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EC demands extra security as unrest grips Bangladesh afresh
Dhaka (PTI): The Election Commission (EC) has demanded extra security for its chief, other commissioners and officials as fresh unrest visibly gripped Bangladesh after gunmen shot an upcoming parliamentary polls candidate and frontline leader of last year's violent street movement dubbed 'July Uprising'.
"The EC has written to the Inspector General of Police (IGP) urging comprehensive security arrangements for the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Election Commissioners (ECs), senior officials of the Election Commission Secretariat," the state-run BSS news agency reported on late Saturday.
The EC simultaneously sought the extra security for its field-level offices ahead of the 13th national election, as two of them came under attack in southeastern Lakshmipur and southwestern Pirojpur by unidentified miscreants after the announcement of the schedule for the upcoming polls on Thursday.
The commission demanded an additional escort vehicle for the CEC, while one such police escort with a vehicle was currently in place for him. It asked for round-the-clock police escorts for the four commissioners and the senior secretary.
The letter said the enhanced security measures were "urgent and necessary," while EC officials said their 10 regional offices, 64 district election offices and 522 sub-district level offices would store important documents and election materials.
The EC on Thursday said the upcoming parliamentary election would be held on February 12 next year, while a day later, Sharif Osman Hadi was shot from a close range in the head, critically wounding him, as he initiated his election campaign from a constituency in the capital.
Critically ill former prime minister Khaleda Zia's Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) simultaneously asked Muhammad Yunus' government to provide security for all candidates in the upcoming election after the attack on Hadi, who leads a radical right-wing cultural group called Inquiab Mancha.
"We demand that the real culprit be identified immediately and brought under the law, and we call upon this government to ensure the security of all candidates without delay," BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said.
Hadi was also a frontline leader of last year's student-led violent uprising that toppled then-prime minister Sheikh Hasina’s Awami League government on August 5, 2024.
His Inquilab Mancha was also at the forefront of a campaign to disband the Awami League, which the interim government complied with in May this year, disqualifying the party from contesting the polls.
The government on Saturday ordered a nationwide security clampdown called 'Operation Devil Hunt 2' amid escalated fears over the law and order situation and promised to issue firearms licenses for election candidates for their own security.
Home adviser (retd) Lieutenant General Jahangir Alam Chowdhury said the government had taken steps to ensure special security for the "frontline fighters" of the July Uprising and promised to issue firearms licenses for the election candidates.
He emphasised that the second phase of the 'Devil Hunt' was aimed at helping ensure public safety and combat the growing threat of illegal arms.
The operation was initially launched in February this year following protests over an attack on the private house of a former minister of the ousted government in the northern suburb of the capital, when it targeted alleged "henchmen" and supporters of the now disbanded Awami League.
