PUC lecturer booked for sexual harassment

July 22, 2014

Mangalore, Jul 22: Mangalore Rural have registered a case against a PUC lecturer on the charges of sexual harassment on first year PU student.

The accused has been identified as Harish Acharya, a Kannada lecturer at St. Raymond's College in Vamanjoor on the outskirts of the city and a resident of Bantwal.

The harassment, according to the complainant, had been going on for a few days. She was made to stand in Harish's chamber when he misbehaved with her. He has been asking her to “adjust with him” for getting more marks and accused of threatening to give her fewer marks in the examinations if she refused his overtures.

Police said the complainant, who bore the trauma for a few days, did not tell her family about the incident. It was her eerie silence that alerted her parents that something was amiss and they confronted her. That's when she revealed what had happened. The parents filed a complaint with the jurisdictional Mangalore Rural (Kankanady) police station.

The victim attempted to end her life, police said, adding that it is yet to be independently verified. Harish tried to force her to share her mobile number with him.

Based on the complaint, a case has been registered under sections 354, 509, 116 read with 306 of the Indian Penal Code. Since the victim is a minor, police also slapped sections 11, 12, and 16 of the POCSO Act, police said.

Comments

Add new comment

Coastaldigest.com reserves the right to delete or block any comments.
Coastaldigset.com is not responsible for its readers’ comments.
Comments that are abusive, incendiary or irrelevant are strictly prohibited.
Please use a genuine email ID and provide your name to avoid reject.

Elusive bamboo shrimp resurfaces in Mangaluru estuary after 70 years

News Network

December 7,2025

Mangaluru, Dec 7: A rare bamboo shrimp has been rediscovered on mainland India more than 70 years after it was last reported, confirming for the first time the presence of Atyopsis spinipes in the country. The find was made by researchers from the Centre for Climate Change Studies at Sathyabama Institute of Science and Technology, Chennai, during surveys in Karnataka and Odisha.

The team — shrimp expert Dr S Prakash, PhD scholar K Kunjulakshmi, and Mangaluru-based researcher Maclean Antony Santos — combined field surveys, ecological assessments and DNA analysis to identify the elusive species. Their findings, published in Zootaxa, resolve decades of taxonomic confusion stemming from a 1951 report that misidentified the species as Atyopsis moluccensis without strong evidence.

The shrimp has now been confirmed at two locations: the Mulki–Pavanje estuary near Mangaluru and the Kuakhai River in Bhubaneswar. Historical specimens from the Andaman Islands, previously labelled as A. moluccensis, were also found to be misidentified and actually belong to A. spinipes.

The rediscovery began after an aquarium hobbyist in Odisha spotted a shrimp in 2022, prompting systematic surveys across Udupi, Karwar and Mangaluru. Four female specimens were collected in Mulki and one in Odisha, all genetically matching.

Researchers warn the species may exist in very small, vulnerable populations as freshwater habitats face increasing pressure from pollution, sand mining and infrastructure development. All verified specimens have been deposited with the Zoological Survey of India for future reference.

Comments