The Hindu / Jaideep Shenoy

Mangalore, Jan 5: The State Government has upgraded the security provided to B Nagaraj Shetty, minister for Fisheries and Muzrai.

Shetty, who is the district in-charge Minister, will henceforth get `Z' category security both at his residence as well as when he is on the move.

The move comes in the wake of repeated threat calls to Shetty and his representation to Home Minister M P Prakash in this regard last month.

Shetty told that he had been receiving threat calls from various places, both within the country and outside, especially the Gulf.

Stating that he and other MLAs of the Bharatiya Janata Party had represented the matter to Prakash after the murder of party leader Sukhananda Shetty on December 1, Shetty pointed out that following this the Government decided to enhance his security.

Striking a stoic note on the repeated threats issued to him, Shetty said these things were common for persons in public life.

Stating that he had apprised Superintendent of Police B Dayananda about the threat calls that he had been receiving for quite some time now, Shetty averred that it was not prudent to ignore them any more. He said it had proved fatal for Sukhananda Shetty, who too was receiving threats.

Dayananda confirmed that the State Government had enhanced the security provided to Shetty to `Z' category.

Not divulging details about the security arrangements involved for operational reasons, Dayananda, however, said it would be more and adequate than the normal security provided to very important persons and Ministers, especially those in charge of districts.