Drug deaths are on the rise after a one-year dip, and Trump officials worry the pandemic is already driving up fatal overdoses.
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Wednesday, July 15, 2020
The ordeal of reporting child sexual abuse cases in Bengaluru during a pandemic
Social workers told TNM that the lack of personnel at one-stop rape crisis centres has added to the plight of reporting a sexual assault crime.
Representation photo
The rising COVID-19 cases have put strain on government hospitals in Bengaluru, which are already facing a shortage of healthcare staff. This has also resulted in impediments in getting child sexual abuse cases registered since survivors, their caregivers and social workers are finding it hard to get complaints filed and ensure that medical exams are done for the forensic reports. Further, social workers whom TNM spoke to also attributed difficulties in reporting child sexual abuse cases to dysfunctional one-stop rape crisis centres in Bengaluru. These centres are set up by the state government, and partially funded using the Nirbhaya Fund allotted by the Union government. Ideally, a survivor should be able to file a police complaint, get a medical exam done and give their statement to the police, all in one place, mitigating the need for them having to run pillar to post. However, social workers say that short-staffing and poor management at such centres has exacerbated the problems in reporting child sexual abuse during the pandemic. The difficulty in getting FIRs registered Kushi Kushalappa, a member of Enfold, an NGO that works towards supporting children who have faced sexual violence said that not a lot of cases are getting reported during lockdown. The reason could be, she said, that children and caregivers are worried about approaching the police at this time for a few reasons. One being that people are concerned about exposing themselves at police stations because of COVID-19. "With police stations currently being considered high risk, the officers have been instructed not to entertain complainants inside police station. Arrangements have been made outside, but this is not exactly conducive to register a case of sexual abuse of a child." Another reason for low reportage, she said, could be because children who are facing sexual violence are stuck with the abuser in their environments with limited or no means to make contact with external agencies who can rescue them. If a child were to register a case against a family member and needs to be placed in a child care institution for care and protection, currently the options are limited. Child care institutions are not in a position to take in children because of concerns about COVID-19,” she added. Brinda Adige, a member of Global Concerns India, which also works towards supporting survivors of child sexual abuse, said that getting an FIR registered is difficult and takes hours on end. For instance, in late April, Brinda was working on a case of a 13-year-old girl who was allegedly sexually assaulted by her neighbour in Bengaluru. "We had to wait for four to five hours to get an FIR registered," she said. What added to the delay was that the case, which was initially filed at one police station, had to be transferred to another. In child sexual abuse cases, the survivors can get a medical exam done before a complaint is filed and the FIR is registered. However, if the survivors approach the police first, an FIR has to be registered first before the medical examination is conducted. "Sometimes, the police ask the medical exam to be conducted before the FIR is registered. Irrespective of this, waiting outside the police station, then running around to get the medical examination and then going to the station to register FIR is doubly hard,” Brinda added. The ordeal of getting a medico-legal case filed With most hospitals catering to COVID patients, Kushi said that the response of medical facilities are less than favourable. Besides, the one-stop centres have been moved out of hospitals, so there is no one who can assist the child and family during the medical examinations. “History taking and medical examinations in cases of sexual violence is a time consuming process that doctors are reluctant to handle at normal times and more so in the present situation,” she added. There are only three one-stop rape crisis centres in the city — Victoria Hospital, Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospital, and Baptist Hospital. These centres, in both the governement hospitals ahve been moved out of the room locted near the trauma centres. However, social workers say that there are no designated teams and hospitals rely on their existing staff to cater to the survivors of sexual assault who show up to the centres as well. Ideally, these centres should have a doctor, a counsellor, a legal aid professional, a social worker and medical support staff. This team is to ensure that the medico-legal cases are filed on time and forensic evidence is collected properly. However, this doesn’t always happen. In the case of the 13-year-old girl who was allegedly sexually assaulted by her neighbour, Brinda said that they had to pressurise and persuade doctors at Bowring and Lady Curzon Hospital to conduct a medical exam of the child. After three to four hours of persuading, a female doctor finally conducted the medical examination. “Two of the three centres are in government hospitals, which have COVID-19 patients and it is not advisable to take children there. Hence, these procedures are getting delayed," Brinda said, adding that she has had to wait for eight to 10 hours along with survivors at these one-stop crisis centres, for a doctor to show up and do the medical exam. "The state's Department of Women and Child Welfare has been sending back Nirbhaya Funds every year as it remains largely unutilised. What we need are teams at the one-stop rape crisis centres. What we also require is for the government to use the Nirbhaya Fund wisely," Brinda Adige said. Speaking to TNM, an official with the Department of Women and Child Welfare said that the state government is trying to hire professionals to manage the one-stop rape crisis centres, but there are no takers. "Many doctors are being recruited for COVID-19 cause only. A lot of funds from various schemes have been diverted to handle the situation. Even doctors and support staff are reluctant to join. But we are trying to establish teams," the senior official said. “This deslay does not mean that people who want to report a case will be turned back by the police or a hospital. They can be assisted through the process by Childline and other NGOs. Also public need to be informed about available mental health services, so even if it is not possible to report immediately, the child or adult facing sexual violence can access mental health services and possibly develop some coping mechanisms,” Kushi added.
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COVID-19: Karnataka to procure 2 lakh more antigen tests kits
So far 50,000 such kits have been already allotted for Bengaluru.
The Karnataka government is going to procure another two lakh antigen test kits, in its effort to contain the COVID-19 spread in the state and in particular Bengaluru. Additional Director of Karnataka State Drug Logistics and Warehousing Society, N Manjushree, told TNM, “We had already purchased and supplied 1 lakh kits. We are in the process of procuring another 2 lakhs antigen kits.” Antigen tests can give the result in five to 10 minutes unlike RT-PCR (Reverse Transcription Polymerase Chain Reaction) test which often takes a day. Moreover, it does not require a lab setup nor pose a biosafety hazard and is much cheaper than the RT-PCR test. It was earlier reported how lab results were delayed for Bengaluru as many staff working in the government-run laboratories had gotten infected. “These kits are used mostly for healthcare workers, or persons who have high people to people contact. The other category we are tergetting are patients with influenza like illness (ILI) and severe acute respiratory infection (SARI) or any other symptomatic patients,” Dr CN Manjunath, state nodal officer for COVID-19 testing told TNM. He added, “If the results come back positive for these patients, then there is no need for confirmatory tests with RT-PCR kits. The same holds true if the result is negative for asymptomatic patients. But if the results are negative when the patient is symptomatic, we need to go for a confirmatory test.” While Medical Education Minister Dr K Sudhakar had earlier said that the state bulletin will have a breakup of tests carried out by RT-PCR and antigen tests from Tuesday, this was not the case. An official said that out of the 23,674 tests that were carried out on Tuesday, 3,000-plus were antigen tests. Among the 1 lakh such test kits, 50,000 were given to health authorities for use in Bengaluru only. An official said the testing target for each district is primarily on four factors—- (1) positivity rate (2) deaths (3) case fatality rate (4) source wise composition of positive cases. All of the factors are comparatively high for Bengaluru.
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Bengaluru pvt hospitals must display COVID-19 bed allocation boards: Govt
The Karnataka government was acting on complaints that COVID-19 patients were struggling to find a hospital bed at private hospitals.
File photo
Drawing flak from the opposition and civil society that there was no clear information on the availability of beds in Bengaluru to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic, the Karnataka government on Wednesday asked all private hospitals in the city to display information at their reception counter itself. Though a Government Order (GO) issued earlier states that 50% of all hospital beds under Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) limits should be reserved for COVID-19 patients, it has been reported that several citizens were struggling to find a hospital bed, at government and private institutions. In a notification dated July 15, the government has said, “...some patients are finding difficulty in getting beds even after the allocation is made by (the) central allocation system of BBMP. This is causing a lot of hardship to patients. Therefore, it is made mandatory that all hospitals registered under Karnataka Private Medical Establishment (KPME) Act should display at the reception counter, a bed allocation display board.” The state government said that the board should should display the following details: 1. Name of the Hospital. 2. Total number of beds (as per of KPME registration) 3. Total number of beds allocated for COVID-19 patients referred by BBMP (Minimum 50% of total hospital beds) The government mandated that the board should also have a column titled reserved, occupied and available, notifying the breakdown of beds. Further, the notification stated that the “data must corroborate with the data of the central bed allocation system of BBMP.” The notification issued by Chief Secretary TM Vijay Bhaskar said that the board should be ready by Thursday. “Display board should be arranged by July 16. Noncompliance of this order will attract punishment under relevant sections of the Disaster Management Act, 2005 and Indian Penal Code,” the notification stated. The BBMP has also set up a dashboard showing real-time bed availability for COVID-19 patients, which can be accessed here. Read: Attention Bengaluru: COVID-19 hospital bed availability is live on this dashboard
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Bengaluru pvt hospitals must display COVID-19 bed allocation boards: Govt
The Karnataka government was acting on complaints that COVID-19 patients were struggling to find a hospital bed at private hospitals.
File photo
Drawing flak from the opposition and civil society that there was no clear information on the availability of beds in Bengaluru to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic, the Karnataka government on Wednesday asked all private hospitals in the city to display information at their reception counter itself. Though a Government Order (GO) issued earlier states that 50% of all hospital beds under Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) limits should be reserved for COVID-19 patients, it has been reported that several citizens were struggling to find a hospital bed, at government and private institutions. In a notification dated July 15, the government has said, “...some patients are finding difficulty in getting beds even after the allocation is made by (the) central allocation system of BBMP. This is causing a lot of hardship to patients. Therefore, it is made mandatory that all hospitals registered under Karnataka Private Medical Establishment (KPME) Act should display at the reception counter, a bed allocation display board.” The state government said that the board should should display the following details: 1. Name of the Hospital. 2. Total number of beds (as per of KPME registration) 3. Total number of beds allocated for COVID-19 patients referred by BBMP (Minimum 50% of total hospital beds) The government mandated that the board should also have a column titled reserved, occupied and available, notifying the breakdown of beds. Further, the notification stated that the “data must corroborate with the data of the central bed allocation system of BBMP.” The notification issued by Chief Secretary TM Vijay Bhaskar said that the board should be ready by Thursday. “Display board should be arranged by July 16. Noncompliance of this order will attract punishment under relevant sections of the Disaster Management Act, 2005 and Indian Penal Code,” the notification stated.
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Video: Bengaluru startup tests prototype of driverless car
Besides building autonomous cars from scratch, the company is also working on a ‘driving kit’ that can be retrofitted to existing automobiles.
Ashwin Mahesh
Living true to its tag of the ‘Silicon Valley of India’, Bengaluru may be the city which makes the first driverless car from India. A video uploaded earlier this week by Ashwin Mahesh, a city-based entrepreneur, offered a glimpse into one such endeavour by a company called BTI-Flux. The company, other than building autonomous cars from scratch, is also working on an autonomous driving-kit that can be retrofitted to existing automobiles. In the brief video shot from the backseat, it shows how a regular car is wired up to a computer, to make it driverless. The vehicle mostly moves in a straight path and the steering wheel adjusts to the minor bends of the road on its own. The software, which controls the movement of the car, is aided by cameras and other sensors. The wiring and the steering. A lot of fun to be able to try such things and explore their potential. A lot of this is... Posted by Ashwin Mahesh on Saturday, 11 July 2020 “As the video shows, we are at a fairly advanced stage and the development cycle is mostly done. We now need to test till we get to the final product. We are at the foundation stage of that. The next step for us is obstacle tracking and avoidance. We have already made the system ready to read traffic signs, signals and even animals and now we have to test those aspects,” Angad Gadgil, head of operations and spokesperson of the company, told TNM. “We are looking at a timeline of two years before we are ready to hit the market. The idea is to make the cars safer than those being driven by a human driver as it can never be under influence, can’t be fatigued and it will never compromise on rules,” he added. Speaking with TNM, Mahesh said that members of the BTI-Flux team approached him asking if they could use one of Lithium’s older cars to test their retrofitting kit. Lithium is a company set up by Mahesh which offers electric cabs on a B2B (business to business) basis. “This is my limited role in this project, which is mainly just encouraging them. As things stand, the final product might take two years’ time to come up. The video clearly shows that it is possible to drive a car with software as we have seen elsewhere. The next question is how good is it and how will it fare with obstacles,” he said. Stating that it may still be difficult for such cars to hit the streets of Bengaluru, he says that they can be put to use in conditioned settings like airports, ports, college campuses and other similar areas where paths are fixed. “There are very specific movement corridors. For example, these self-driving cars can be used to bring a vehicle from the parking lot to the passenger terminal. It will maybe even work inside company and college campuses where people need to move back and forth. I think in these areas, we can expect to see them in about two years,” Mahesh said. He further added that with time and investment, the technology will only get better. Other than the mobility needs of individuals, the idea of automated vehicles is touted to be a game changer for the logistics industry. Big names like Uber, Google and Tesla have already tested their ‘robo-trucks’ to carry large loads of cargo. However, in India, the government is more skeptical of the technology with Union Minister for Roads and Highways Nitin Gadkari saying in September 2019 that they did not want to encourage driverless cars in the country as it could lead to the loss of jobs in India.
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Karnataka tribals evicted from Bandipur in the 1970s allege raw deal in relocation
The tribal families say they have been leading a miserable life after the eviction due to the lack of a suitable rehabilitation package.
Families that voluntarily opt to move out of forest areas nowadays get a rehabilitation package and the attention of the Forest department for some years which monitors their relocation. But several tribal families evicted from the Bandipur and Nagarahole forests after the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 came into effect allege that they got a raw deal without any rehabilitation measures after they sacrificed their lands. Hundreds of these tribal families spread across Hunsur and HD Kote, both in Mysuru, and in Virajpet in Madikeri, who now stay on the edges of these forests, say that their lives have been miserable due to the lack of a suitable rehabilitation package. The tribal communities claim they were “forcibly” sent out and demand rehabilitation on par with the present rehabilitation package. “I was very young when my family lived in Seeguru Hadi (now renamed Kere Hadi), a tribal hamlet inside Nagarhole forest near Udboor gate. We were driven out by Forest department officials, who told us that we could no longer stay inside the forest areas. After being evicted, we made a living on the border of the forest,” recounts Sannappa, who belongs to the Jenu Kuruba tribal community. He adds that when they lived inside the forest area his family had lands for cultivation but after being driven out of the forest, they were not provided any benefits. To make a living, Sannappa works as a daily wages labourer whenever the Forest department engages him and moves to Kodagu with the rest of the tribal men to work as a labourer in coffee plantations. Other residents of the tribal hamlet share a similar story to that of Sannappa. Activist Ashok says that the Forest department hasn’t come to the rescue of these evicted tribal families so far. In the past, Janata houses were constructed for them under some government scheme. Now, these kachcha houses constructed out of mud are in a dilapidated condition while basic amenities are a mirage for the evicted families. Offering hope for the tribals, Shailendra Kumar, a member of the Yalava tribal community from N. Begur Chamayyana Hadi near the Bandipur National Park, says the evicted families can be rehabilitated under some clauses of the Forest Rights Act, 2006. Tribal leaders say that the Forest department demands to see documents that prove they lived inside the forest but none of the tribal families have any such document. As it has been 40 years since the eviction took place, Shailendra Kumar says the area where the tribals resided earlier in the forest is now full of thick vegetative growth making it impossible for individual families to even locate the lands used by them. Shailendra wants a report submitted by Prof Muzaffar Assadi on the tribals to emulate the model of the Basavanagiri Hadi rehabilitation, wherein about 154 families evicted from Bandipur National Park were relocated after the intervention of the National Human Rights Commission, to be considered for rehabilitation of forcibly “evicted” tribals. Activist Ksheera Sagar who has been observing the living conditions of the tribals in HD Kote taluk for three decades says they live a pathetic life with none of the social security measures reaching them. It is time that the state government opened its eyes to their problems and came to their aid, he says. A meeting to discuss rehabilitative measures took place between HD Kote MLA Anil Kumar, Nagarahole National Park officials, among others a few days ago. Nagarahole National Park director Mahesh Kumar says the implementation of the Muzaffar Assadi report is pending before the state government. If the evicted tribal families are seeking rehabilitation under the Forest Rights Act, Mahesh Kumar says, they have to contact the Integrated Tribal Development Project (ITDP). Ksheera Sagar says that the Muzaffar Assadi report covers all tribal families evicted from forests and urges its implementation. Puttabasava, a tribal man who is fighting for the cause of the evicted families, says several meetings have taken place in the past between elected representatives and forest officials but nothing substantial has happened to help the families get a rehabilitation package that will help improve the quality of their life. While a wildlife conservationist says some evicted families got agricultural lands to support their livelihood, Ksheera Sagar says not all were lucky to get the lands given some years ago. According to the wildlife conservationist, the evicted families can still get rehabilitation from the state government if they wage a legal battle. Girisha is a freelancer who writes on wildlife and the environment.
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