Shakti scheme set to cross 500-crore ticket milestone today
Bengaluru: The Congress-led Karnataka government’s flagship Shakti scheme, which allows women to travel free of cost in government buses, is poised to achieve a remarkable milestone on Monday—500 crore rides since its launch in June last year.
To commemorate the occasion, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, Deputy Chief Minister D.K. Shivakumar, and Transport Minister Ramalinga Reddy will symbolically issue tickets to women passengers in a special event.
Launched on June 11, 2023, just weeks after the Congress party returned to power, Shakti was the first of the five major poll guarantees to be implemented. Since then, it has transformed public transport access for women across the state.
“There’s no parallel to this scheme anywhere in the world,” said Reddy, highlighting its scale and impact. He also announced that the government is moving forward with a plan to introduce smartcards for beneficiaries. The cards aim to prevent misuse, such as conductors allegedly issuing fake tickets to inflate ride counts, and improve transparency in public spending.
Reddy added that the proposal has been submitted to the Finance Department for approval and will soon be placed before the cabinet.
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Two arrested in K'taka for assaulting minors, uploading CSAM content
Bengaluru (PTI): Two men were arrested for allegedly sexually assaulting two minor girls, recording the acts on mobile phones and uploading the videos online as child sexual abuse material, police said on Thursday.
The accused have been identified as Kiran Kumar (29), hailing from Chitradurga district, and Aditya M K (20), hailing from Shivamogga district, they said.
A probe was initiated after information was received from the NCRP portal regarding a suspected instance of creation of Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) for online dissemination, police said.
Accordingly, a case was registered at Kaggalipura Police Station under relevant sections of the IT Act on May 10, they added.
Investigation revealed that two minor girl victims were exploited and videos were created and uploaded to the internet. The child victims have subsequently recorded their statements as per procedure and further necessary legal steps have been taken, Pronab Mohanty Director General of Police, Cyber Command, said in a statement.
Based on the statements of the victims, the accused persons, who allegedly assaulted the minors, recorded the acts on mobile phones and uploaded the videos online, were arrested, he said.
Following the probe, sections 65(2) (rape) and 70 (gangrape) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, along with relevant sections of the POCSO Act, have been added to the FIR, police said.
Officials collected relevant information and on May 12, arrested the accused persons and seized three mobile phones belonging to them, in which the videos had allegedly been recorded, he said.
The accused were later produced before the court and taken into police custody for further investigation, he added.
According to him, in CSAM cases, police usually apprehend offenders who have downloaded such content or have kept them in their possession after obtaining them from elsewhere, usually the internet.
"The present case is one of the very few instances where content creators and uploaders have been apprehended," Mohanty added.
