Here are the big stories from Karnataka today

Karnataka Today newsletter: Clamour for early polls to Mysuru City Corporation grows louder, and more

The clamour for early polls to Mysuru City Corporation (MCC) appears to be only growing with a former corporator belonging to the JD(S) S.B.M. Manju echoing the sentiments aired by MCC Elections Struggle Committee. Mr. Manju represented ward number 6 in Gokulam in the MCC until November 2023.

The former corporator said the Congress party claims to swear by decentralisation of power, but is doing injustice to the people of Mysuru by not holding elections to MCC even after one year and three months since its tenure expired in November 2023.

He argued that not only have routine civic works in localities been affected, even the grants released by the Centre for various projects were returned unspent in view of the absence of an elected body.

The Union Government has reiterated that there is no proposal to constitute an arecanut board in Karnataka, which ranks first in arecanut production. Minister of State Ramnath Thakur was replying to an unstarred question by Davanagere MP Prabha Mallikarjun on whether an arecanut board has been proposed for processing, marketing, developing, value addition, and price regulation.

The demand to set up an arecanut board to protect growers’ interests, ensure remunerative price and undertake research to prevent pest/fungal infection in the crop, is over a decade old. Following recommendations by Karnataka Agriculture Price Commission, the State constituted a technical committee in 2015 to examine the proposal; but there has been no progress since.

Justice K.N. Phaneendra, Upa Lokayukta of Karnataka, took serious exception to poor maintenance of Mahatma Gandhi Park in Shivamogga city. Justice Phaneendra, who was on a three-day visit to Shivamogga, visited the park in the morning along with officers of the Shivamogga district administration on March 19.

On noticing poor maintenance of the park and no supply of water in the washrooms, he took officials of the city corporation to task. He told the officials to ensure that basic amenities were improved within 20 days. He ordered that a case be registered against the executive engineer of the corporation for poor maintenance, to be withdrawn once the condition of the park was improved.