Israeli siege, bombardment force Gaza’s 16 hospitals, 50 healthcare clinics to shut

Bengaluru: Karnataka Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar and other state ministers on Saturday rubbished allegations about their role in the circulation of pen drives containing explicit videos involving Hassan MP Prajwal Revanna.

BJP leader and advocate G Devaraje Gowda, who is in custody after being arrested in a sexual abuse case and is also facing charges of video leak, on Friday alleged that Shivakumar and four other ministers are behind the circulation of the pen drives and was being fixed in false cases as he did not agree to be part of their plan.

He has even alleged that he was offered Rs 100 crore by Shivakumar to "bring a bad name" to the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and to tarnish the image of JD(S) leader H D Kumaraswamy in Prajwal Revanna's obscene video case.

Speaking to reporters here, Shivakumar said, "Better, let him (Gowda) file a case before Lokayukta or any other agency. I think he has some problems mentally. I'm very sorry, the national and state media shouldn't have picked up such baseless allegations. A person who is in jail, how can he make such allegations? All these are baseless. I don't want to comment." 

Asked if he will be filing any defamation case against Gowda, he said, "I don't want to make any comment or speak on a person who is mentally sick. I appeal to his party people to get him a good treatment." Shivakumar also asserted that his government's commitment to get justice for women victims of the sexual abuse case, and expressed confidence about the Special Investigation Team's (SIT) ongoing probe.

While being taken from court in Hassan, Gowda on Friday spoke to media and alleged that Shivakumar is behind pen drive case, and a team of four Ministers -- N Chaluvarayaswamy, Krishna Byre Gowda, Priyank Kharge and another minister -- was formed to handle this, with an intention to bring bad name to BJP, PM Modi and Kumaraswamy.

He said Shivakumar had asked him to say that Kumaraswamy is behind the distribution of pen drives, but as he did not agree to it, he is being fixed in false cases.

Minister Priyank Kharge said Gowda has alleged that three responsible ministers in the state government were part of a team and that there was a conspiracy. "We will discuss whatever legal course, we will take it." 

"Devaraje Gowda might be doing this to defame Shivakumar and Siddaramaiah. If he had a Rs 100 crore offer, he should have told Amit Shah (Union Home Minister) and get it investigated. He could have got CBI, ED, or IT raids done. Why didn't he do it? Claims have been made that he (Gowda) was sent Rs 5 crore as advance at a club, let them get CCTV footage and see who were all there," Kharge said.

While speaking to reporters here, he further said Gowda is a lawyer. When he was deposed before the Judge he should have told about the documents he has and should have presented to the court.

Minister Chaluvarayaswamy said allegations about the role of Shivakumar and a team of ministers being formed to oversee the circulation of pen drives are 'baseless', and he questioned Gowda's morality to make such accusations.

"If Gowda proves that Chaluvarayaswamy, Priyank Kharge and Krishna Byre Gowda had held a meeting on this case and we as a team were given responsibility and we were involved in this case, I will apologise," he said and alleged that Gowda was being used to mislead and deviate from the main case of sexual abuse.

Bengaluru: BJP leader Anantkumar Hegde represented Uttara Kannada Lok Sabha segment in Karnataka for six terms and now gynecologist Anjali Nimbalkar is putting up a spirited fight seeking to turn the tide and "deliver" it for the Congress.

Dr Nimbalkar is taking on former Karnataka Assembly Speaker Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri, who replaced Hegde, in this BJP stronghold.

A former Congress MLA, she lost the Assembly elections from Khanapur in Belagavi district last year.

The 62-year-old Kageri, a six-term MLA and a former minister, was also defeated in the Assembly polls from Sirsi.

"In the past 30 years, the voice of Uttara Kannada was not spoken and not even a single question was asked in the Parliament," Nimbalkar said in an apparent dig at Hegde.

If elected, she said her focus is to address the local issues related to forest dwellers, getting them 'patra' for their own land -- a battle they have been fighting for long.

Also on her priority list is getting a multispecialty hospital in Kumta as per people's demand, generating employment and focusing on tourism for the overall development of Uttara Kannada.

"Issues related to forest dwellers -- they want a 'patra' for their own land -- we will try and put forth these issues in the first session itself and we will see to it that maximum applications which are pending with the Central government get cleared during the first session itself," she said in an interview.

"So, our thing is that at least 50 per cent of the jobs should be given to the local Kannadigas in the Central schemes which are implemented in the district," she said.

Noting that Uttara Kannada has a combination of both beaches and temples, Nimbalkar said the district can be developed internationally in a much higher scale than "what actually Goa or Kerala is".

The Congress candidate is also banking on the five guarantee schemes launched by the Siddaramaiah-led government in Karnataka and the promises made by party in its manifesto at the national level.

Responding to a question, she expressed happiness that the Congress has fielded a total of six women candidates out of 28 Lok Sabha constituencies in Karnataka.

While campaigning, Nimbalkar said she was overwhelmed to see a large number of people, especially women, turning up for her rallies despite the intense heat in Uttara Kannada.

"They are very happy that the Congress has given a woman candidate and an educated candidate who herself is a doctor and a gynecologist. So they are excited that, yes, she can be our voice in the Parliament who can fight for our rights," the 47-year-old said.

"I have worked as an MLA (Khanapur), so they have seen my work in the Assembly and the expectations are like, yes, she will be the one who will be speaking for us and that faith is seen in their eyes," she said.

Nimbalkar strongly believes that when women enter any field, it brings a different perspective - be it in terms of management, policy formulation or even as homemakers.

Uttara Kannada is among the 14 constituencies going for polls in Karnataka under second phase on May 7.

Karnataka has 28 Lok Sabha seats and the first phase of polling was held on April 26.

The Israeli regime is forcibly evacuating Palestinians from the eastern part of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip amid the prospect of its widely-discouraged ground invasion.

“The estimate is around 100,000 people,” an Israeli military spokesman told journalists on Monday when asked how many people were being evacuated.

International organizations, including the United Nations, have repeatedly warned the regime against invading the city, citing its hosting around 1.5 million Palestinian refugees.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said a ground assault on Rafah would “put the final nail in the coffin” for humanitarian aid operations in the Gaza Strip.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs also said, “Any ground operation would mean more suffering and death,” with an official saying “It could be a slaughter of civilians.”

Multiple aid agencies, including the Norwegian Refugee Council, have likewise warned against a Rafah offensive.

The NRC said such an invasion “would profoundly exacerbate the already catastrophic levels of need and the humanitarian emergency for millions of civilians with nowhere left to go.”

The official alleged Hamas had killed three Israeli forces on Sunday, attacking them from Rafah.

The evacuation order came a sat least 22 people lost their lives in the regime’s airstrikes killed in Rafah earlier on Monday.

Rafah’s evacuation “is part of our plans to dismantle Hamas,” the Israeli spokesman added, referring to the Palestinian resistance movement that has been defending Gaza in the face of the war.

The Palestinians have fled there from the ravages of a war that the regime began waging against Gaza on October 7, following a retaliatory operation by the coastal sliver’s resistance groups.

At least 34,683 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed and 78,018 others injured so far during the brutal military onslaught.

On Friday, Hossam Badran, a member of Hamas’ Political Bureau, said Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s insistence on carrying out a ground invasion of Rafah was a key stumbling block in negotiations aimed at a truce agreement.

The Israeli premier has said the regime would go ahead with invading the city “with or without” a truce.

Hamas has, however, asserted that the regime has failed to defeat the resistance during the war.