Articles by Deepa Mohan

It's called "koley basava" in Karnataka, and in Tamil Nadu, it's called the "boom-boom mAdu"...boom-boom, probably because of the sound produced by the drum the man carries and rubs with a stick. He also usually plays a long wind instrument called the naagaswaram; you can see it covered, slung behind his left shoulder. This duo were "off duty" when I clicked them, so the drum and the nagaswaram were not in use. The man will bring it to the front gate and ask it leading questions like "Is this house resident going to be prosperous and happy?" and the animal…

Christmas is over...spare a thought for those who sell knick-knacks like these cheap Santa caps, have so many of them left over...unsold, not putting even the meagre money in their pockets that they were hoping for. Street vendors are not like beggars; they are trying to make money honestly, and it is extremely hard at the bottom of the selling pyramid.

I took this photo on the 23rd of December, 2014, at the Banashankari temple.   With no safety gear, with no precautions, these two men are putting up lights that will illuminate the temple of the "Goddess of the Forest". Why are we so slack about safety precautions? Why do we always assume thatp accidents will never happen to us? The mess of wires atop the roof of the structure is nothing short of an invitation to an accident. Can the temple not provide its workers with insulated gloves at the very least?

One of the small, but intensely annoying practices that I am increasingly finding is that of security guards in front of large office/commercial buildings, obviously acting on instructions, to "reserve" the parking space in front of the buildings for those who are visiting an office in that building, and to prevent others from parking there.   In fact, Corporation Bank in J P Nagar  3rd Phase (1st Main, along the Mini Forest) also went to the extent of putting up cardboard notices on the chain-link fence saying that the space was for their customers. Saner counsels have prevailed and the notices…

The practice of charging the members of the public for cameras (aftear 8 am or 9 am)at many public spaces is irritating a lot of people. Joiston Pereira writes:"The entry ticket and camera fee....is the Horticulture Department's new money making racket. At Madiwala lake, which is.under the Brihat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP)  and to an extent, the Horticulture Department, the tickets for cameras are a whopping 100 rupees and for video cameras it is  Rs.200, while entry is a modest  Rs, 10  Where all this money goes, God alone knows. The lake clearly isn't maintained very well. "As for the…

  Though it is illegal to have licence number plates only in Kannada (or any regional language), people routinely flout this rule, and cite their love for Kannada as a reason to have number plates in Kannada alone. It would be more credible if they had number plates in both Kannada and English; with only Kannada numerals, the doubt arises that it is being done to prevent anyone taking down the number in case of an accident!

Litter along the railway tracks I travelled from Bangalore to Delhi and all along the tracks, I found vast quantities of plastic and other litter, thrrown not only by careless passengers, but, to my horror, dumped by Railway employees, especially catering contractors.  Does Indian Railways not believe that this is our country, and in cleanliness?  Shame, Indian Railways...you truly must "clean up your act"!  Disposal of waste must be (and is not) an essential part of travelling.

ook release of "The Song of the Magpie Robin. The autobiography of Zafar Futehally" by Dr K Ullas Karanth.    Wednesday 10, December 2014. 6.30    BIC Auditorium, TERI complex 4th Main, 2nd Cross Domlur II Stage, Bangalore 560071   RSVP 98865 99675

When we observe water birds, we find that they have many different varieties of fishing for food, and here's one of the most interesting. The birds in my photographs are Painted Storks, beautiful birds which you will see in almost all large lakes of Bangalore. I took these photos at Kaikondrahalli Lake, on November 23rd, 2014. Here's a Stork, standing in the water, getting ready to look for its breakfast. The eye is already cast down in concentration. As the birds look for fish under the water, they raise one wing and hold it just above their head level. This…

The cast and some of the crew taking a bow after the show. It's always a challenge to go to a play after it's done several shows. This happened to me on 28th November, 2014, when I attended the staging of "Our Iceberg Is Melting", by Bangalore Little Theatre (BLT), at MLM Convention Hall, J P Nagar. The play, the fourth of a series, was staged by BLR in partnership with the Association for the Mentally Challenged (AMC), is the dramatization-adaption of the book, "Our Iceberg Is Melting", by Professor John Kotter. The play came about after Priya Venkatesh, long…