BENGALURU: The Karnataka State Bar Council (KSBC) has decided to provide financial assistance of Rs 10,000 to each advocate who has tested positive for Covid-19 and is in home quarantine. Similarly, it has decided to provide Rs 25,000 to each advocate who has been hospitalised owing to Covid-19, stated a release by KSBC chairman L Srinivasa Babu. “I assure to all the advocates and their family that maximum assistance will be given by KSBC during the pandemic,” he said.
He also said that KSBC has succeeded in convincing the Chief Justice to direct the State Government to nominate nodal officers in each taluk and district headquarters to look after the advocates and their family. Meanwhile, the government has issued a notification appointing Additional Deputy Commissioners of districts as the nodal officers.
Advocates Association of Bangalore had requested the Chief Justice to direct the State Government to appoint nodal officers and KSBC to give an assistance of Rs1 lakh to Covid-positive advocates. AAB president A P Ranganath said that they held a virtual meeting with ADCs of Bengaluru Urban and Rural districts, Advocate General and judicial officers on Saturday, subsequent to the notification issued by the government appointing nodal officers.
Cannot direct state to conduct autopsies on bodies of Covid victims: Karnataka HC
Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court declined to grant a request made by a petitioner to issue directions to the state government to conduct autopsies on the bodies of each person who allegedly died due to Covid-19. ?”We do not think that at this stage, we can issue a direction to the state government to undertake the autopsies of each and every person who has allegedly died due to Covid-19,” a division bench of Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice Aravind Kumar said. ?The petitioner, K M Sreenivasamurthy, an advocate from Chamarajanagar, also asked the court to direct the state to pay ex-gratia compensation to the families of victims of the Chamarajanagar tragedy. The court responded stating that this request would have to be kept pending till the preliminary report of inquiry is placed on record either by the state government appointed officer or the panel appointed by the Legal Services Authority. ENSw