‘Give information on all facilities to public’

Minister for Large and Medium Industries Jagadish Shettar during his visit to the COVID War Room in Hubballi on Thursday. (Source: Kiran Bakale)

Minister for Large and Medium Industries and Dharwad district in-charge Jagadish Shettar on Thursday asked officials to make available to the public updated information on the availability of beds at designated hospitals and COVID Care Centres and other facilities.

Speaking to the officials during his visit to the COVID-19 War Room set up on the BRTS office premises in Hubballi, Mr. Shettar asked them to also make available online all information on all COVID-19-related facilities for the benefit of the public.

The Minister was accompanied by Deputy Commissioner Nitesh Patil, Hubballi Dharwad Police Commissioner R. Dileep, Managing Director of NWKRTC and HD-BRTS chief Rajendra Cholan and other officials. He earlier inspected the functioning of the war room, sought information from the officials and gave some suggestions to them.

At the war room, all surveillance cameras installed in the city are being monitored. Briefing the Minister on the functioning of the war room, Deputy General Manager of HD-BRTS Ganesh Rathod said that 50 surveillance cameras of BRTS and 250 surveillance cameras of the Police Department and Hubballi Dharwad Municipal Corporation had been connected to the war room and centralised monitoring was being carried out from there.

The war room is not only helping the administration in taking action against those violating guidelines, but it is also helping it in maintenance of records of all information related to the pandemic. The information of all quarantine centres, hospitals, GPS-based information on residential address of patients who tested positive is being maintained at the war room.

Managing Director of Hubballi Dharwad Smart City Limited (HDSCL) Shakeel Ahmed said that the war room was functioning effectively for the last three months with the coordination of the district administration, the Health Department, the municipal corporation, BRTS and HDSCL staff.

All notifications of the district administration were being circulated online for the benefit of the public apart from providing services related to e-pass, telemedicine and helpline, he said. Special Officer of HDSCL S.H. Naregal, Manjunath of BRTS and others were present.