PLANTERS PICKET COFFEE BOARD OFFICE; INSURANCE OFFICIALS DISAPPEAR

Madikeri December 28, 2007

Tension prevailed at Somwarpet yesterday as planters picketed Coffee Board office as insurance officials distributing compensation disappeared without notice.

Agriculture Insurance officials from Bangalore had come to Somwarpet and began to distribute rain relief insurance. They distributed cheques of rupees 3300 each to about 300 planters till afternoon. Planters had assembled in large number to collect insurance and they were demanding that the amount should be minimum rupees eight thousand each.

The officials left the venue of distribution with a pretext of going for lunch and disappeared. Later they sat in dharna in front of the venue for a long time and went to coffee board office and locked the doors. Police interfered and brought the situation under control.

APMC president Takeri Ponnappa spoke on the occasion and served an ultimatum till end of this month to the officials to distribute the required amount of insurance. He warned of severe protest, if the officials fail to initiate action.

PEOPLE WARN FOREST DEPARTMENT TO CONTROL ELEPHANT MENACE;THREATEN TO CUT TREES

Hundreds of farmers and agriculturists yesterday gathered at Kodlipet and bombarded forest officials who are failing in controlling elephant menace.

The Ryots walked to Kodlipet on foot and held a rally condemning the attitude of officials. Shantaveri Vasanth, a planter addressed the gathering and said that they will cut and sell teak wood trees to compensate the loss they incur due to elephant menace. He also warned that the official apathy might lead them to turn into Naxalites.

Protestors explained the plight they are facing by pachyderms and warned that they will take to streets if their life and properties are not protected. Pachyderms have killed couple of people in Kodlipet area this year.They said that the department will give rupees 500 as compensation per acre for the loss of crop during elephant rampage. Whereas the farmers will incur a loss of rupees 25 to thirty thousand. The government should increase the amount and control the menace by end of January or face the wrath of the people, they said.

Tahasildar Suresh Kumar, Range foresty officers Keshavegowda and Dayanand arrived at the spot. Forest officials apologized as they could not control the elephant menace and assured to take action. A memorandum was submitted to the tahasildar who assured to send it to government.

TWO TEACHERS SUSPENDED; EDUCATION SECRETARY VISITS KODAGU;

Education secretary Vijaya Bhaskar yesterday visited Kodagu and visited many schools to inspect the progress they are making.

Vijaya Bhaskar instructed the DDPI to suspend Vedaprasad, a teacher at Murnad for dereliction of duty and Shivram, principal at Kushalnagar Junior college to have assaulted a student who went deaf due to it.

Meanwhile, he held officers meet at Old assembly hall in the evening and said that funds would be released to repair some of the school buildings in the district, which are in a dilapidated condition.

Earlier, he paid visit to Sainik School at Kudige and couple of other institutions in different towns and verified the progress. DDPI Basheer accompanied him.