The High Court on Tuesday directed the State government to provide details, within two weeks, pertaining to the steps taken to provide reservation in jobs to the visually impaired, while recruiting staff for Group ‘C’ to ‘F’ categories in the Education department.

Hearing a petition by the National Federation of the Blind, which had moved the court seeking reservation as fixed by the Union government, the division bench comprising Chief Justice D H Waghela and Justice B V Nagarathna directed the government to furnish details like what yardstick it is adopting in providing reservation and steps taken to identify the real beneficiaries.

The bench expressed displeasure over the delay. The petitioners, in their submission, stated that as per the rules, the government should fix five per cent reservation for disabled candidates in ‘C’ and ‘D’ groups and two per cent for visually-impaired candidates in ‘E’ and ‘F’ groups.

Bail rejected
The High Court has refused to grant bail to Bhupal, arrested for circulating counterfeit notes. The petitioner was arrested by the Sampangiram Nagar police in Bangalore, along with 4,000 counterfeit notes of Rs 500 denomination earlier this year. After his bail plea was rejected by the trial court, he had approached the High Court.

During the hearing, State public prosecutor (SPP) S Dore Raju submitted that the notes recovered were concealed in a Bangla newspaper. “The police also recovered a pistol, cartridges and relevant documents. It is a conspiracy against the nation, a proxy war waged by the enemy country to destabilise the Indian economy,” he told the court.

He submitted that if granted bail, the petitioner might flee from justice and sought that the bail plea be dismissed.

Bettanagere’s bail plea
The High Court has reserved its order in connection with the bail plea by Bettanagere Manja, who is facing the allegation of murdering advocate Ravi.

Senior counsel K M Nataraj, appearing for Manja said he (Manja) was not involved in the murder as he was housed in the central prison and did not have deadly weapons as claimed by the police. He submitted that the claim of a mobile phone conversation between a TV journalist and the accused appears to be false as the prosecution has not seized any mobile phone. Noting that he (accused) had spent a long time in prison, the counsel appealed for his bail.

The SPP Dore Raju opposed the bail plea. “He is a mastermind in the crime,” he said. When the judge questioned about the mobile phone, the SPP said the prosecution had the CD obtained from the news channel and had now sent it to the forensic science laboratory. Justice Nagmohan Das reserved the judgement.