Security stepped up across Belagavi as 10-day Karnataka Legislature session begins
Belagavi (KTK), (PTI): A security blanket has been thrown across the Belagavi city as the winter session of the Karnataka Legislature starts on Monday.
Amid fear over the border row with Maharashtra and disruption due to protests by various communities, the entire city resembles a cantonment of sorts.
Suvarna Vidhana Soudha, where the session is in progress appears like a barrack with policemen deployed all over the place.
According to police sources, nearly 5,000 policemen have been deployed for maintaining law and order in the city.
These policemen include six superintendents of police, 11 additional superintendents of police, 43 deputy SPs, 95 inspectors and 241 sub-inspectors, they added.
The sources also said there will be a sizeable number of policemen deployed at the Vaccine Depot ground where the Madhyavarti Maharashtra Ekikaran Samiti is staging a demonstration demanding merger of Belagavi with Maharashtra.
Some leaders from Maharashtra had wished to participate in the event. A Maharashtra MP Dhairyasheel Mane had even requested the Belagavi district administration to make arrangements for his visit to the city.
However, the district authorities imposed a ban on his entry saying that his possible inflammatory speech may create law and order problems.
Apart from the MES, various groups including farmers, are also staging demonstrations in Belagavi to press for their demands.
This session, which would be the last one of the current Assembly, as the elections are barely four months away, may also see commotion inside the House with political parties trying to draw the attention of people with their protests, sources said.
There are many bills which is likely to be tabled and cleared in the current session.
A controversial anti-Halal bill may also be introduced in the session as a private bill by a BJP legislator, which may cause furore, the sources added.
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Amid row over Waqf land, Karnataka officials to appear before parliamentary panel
New Delhi, Dec 25: Amid a row over Waqf land in Karnataka, officials from the state government are scheduled to appear before the parliamentary panel examining the Waqf Amendment Bill on Thursday.
The Joint Committee on the Waqf Amendment Bill, chaired by BJP member Jagadambika Pal, is scheduled to hear views from representatives of the governments of Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha and Delhi in sittings spread over two days beginning Thursday.
Delhi's Food and Supply Minister Imran Hussain is also scheduled to address the committee on Friday, followed by the recording of evidence by the representatives of the Delhi government.
The deposition of officials from the Congress-led Karnataka government comes in the wake of a row over claims by BJP leaders that over 1500 acres of land belonging to farmers in the state were being taken over by the Waqf board.
Pal had visited Karnataka and interacted with the farmers who had received notices from the state government regarding encroachment over properties belonging to the Waqf Board.
The committee had also written to state governments seeking details of Waqf properties occupied by them in an unauthorised manner as per the Sachar panel report.
The UPA government constituted the Sachar Committee in 2005 to study the social, economic and educational status of the Muslim community in India.
The parliamentary panel was constituted on August 8, soon after the Waqf (Amendment) Bill was introduced in Lok Sabha.
Opposition parties have stridently criticised the amendments proposed by the bill in the existing Waqf Act, alleging that they violate the religious rights of Muslims. The ruling BJP has asserted that the amendments will bring transparency in the functioning of the waqf boards and make them accountable.
