Articles by Revathi Siva Kumar

Recently, the virtual abuse of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, for supporting an interfaith couple, drew attention to the chilling phenomenon of 'trolling' that has seen an exponential rise since the advent of social media. The minister suffered not just verbal, but also relentless sociopathic, emotional slander. In a way, it has been a democratising trend. No one is spared. Anyone who holds a point of view that is different from that of the establishment or the troller has been subject to continuous, intense harrassment and verbal assault on online platforms. A number of well-known names such as Barkha Dutt…

The news on gender ratios in urban India is not only bad, it is also getting worse. In May 2018, a study published by Lancet disclosed that 239,000 girls below five die in India every year. Census 2011 documents that the worst Child Sex Ratios  are found in the cities.  The declining graph over the decades shows that urban Indian gender ratios are more skewed than rural Bharat's, with an average of 902 girls per 1,000 boys between 0-6 years in the cities, compared to 923 girls in rural India. The urban figures have pulled down the national average to 918.  The worst city…

The 80-year-old prime land site of Malleswaram Market seems to be buzzing with construction. Founded in 1940s, the Market located at 11th cross, Malleswaram in Bengaluru is a prime property of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), in the pulsating city of Bengaluru. What was a local market for residents of Malleswaram, with its high real-estate value, but old single level market that accommodated a few vendors, was deemed to be a low-earning area for the city government In June 2017, when Bengaluru became the seventh Karnataka region to get included in the Smart City plan, Malleswaram Market development got earmarked…

What is common among urban waterways, economics and culture? All three are intertwined, and can complement as well as transform each other. But they can also lead to weakening urban systems if they are poorly planned, as the Indian port city of Kochi has shown. However, the city has seen recent attempts at overall upgrading of systems and researchers from the Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER) emphasise the role that the city’s waterways can play in this makeover effort. Kochi’s crisscrossing canals and rivers linked to a backwater system can significantly impact its socio-economic and cultural…

Even as the leaden, monsoon skies are darkening over an overgrown metro, many might be surprised to learn that Bengaluru was added to the ‘Smart City’ list on June, 2017. It has become the seventh city from Karnataka to get into the Smart City list. It bemuses many, because the 'honour' and implication is still not very well-known to everyone. A year after the city has become part of the list, there is still delay in implementation. Why? It is a big project, after all, says AR Ravi, Joint Director (Planning), Urban Development Department (UDD). Just the planning and the…

Govindaa hari Govindaa.. Munirathna Naidu Govindaa! A video clip starts playing on the mobile. The middle-aged man watching it bursts into laughter. An imitation version of the popular chant that is chanted by people climbing up the Tirupati Hills in Andhra Pradesh has been used to project the misdeeds of Munirathna Naidu, a contestant from Rajarajeshwarinagar constituency in Bengaluru. The constituency had been perceived as sensitive by the Election Commission, and the voting was postponed to May 28, instead of May 15. The political material that lands up on WhatsApp like this is entertaining and opinionated, and makes people form…

Will Indian cities heed a global wake-up call at least now? This year’s air pollution list is unprecedented, with 14 Indian cities ranked as the most contaminated among the top 15 international urban centres in the WHO database comprising 4,300 hotspots. Kanpur tops the list with the highest concentration of PM 2.5, according to information from the World Health Organisation (WHO). It is followed by Faridabad, Varanasi, Gaya, Patna, Delhi, Lucknow, Agra, Muzaffarpur, Srinagar, Gurgaon, Jaipur, Patiala and Jodhpur. PM2.5 refers to fine inhale-able particle pollutants that have diameters of 2.5 micrometres or smaller. These are comprised of microscopic solids or liquid droplets…

Fed up of viral WhatsApp posts regarding an eerie, deadly viral fever that spreads through fruits? Maybe. But don’t stop reading about it. Knowing is the first step to manage the virus and the disease it brings. This virus has the strange name of ‘Nipah’, quite a nippy character that is getting into all the open fruits and vegetables you are supposed to consume to keep yourself healthy. Why is Nipah in news now? Nipah hit the headlines because of recent deaths in Kerala, due to brain fever caused by this virus. Also called Henipavirus in the medical world, NiV…

Sathish M. Reddy, incumbent MLA of Bommanahalli constituency, did not get the time to give a proper interview for Citizen Matters, but did manage to squeeze in some time to share his work in the last 10 years. Excerpts: You have been an MLA in Bommanahalli for 10 years. When you started, this entire area was still developing, but today it has become a thriving, commercial, developed and rich area. What was your vision then? Have you achieved it? When I took over, HSR Layout was a part of BBMP. There were no proper water connections, sanitation or roads. After I…

India’s road safety crisis is no secret anymore. The numbers are so staggering that they could cause a few accidents from shock, if you just read them! At least 4,80,652 accidents led to 1,50,785 deaths in 2016, which means 413 people died everyday in 1,317 road accidents. There were at least 17 deaths in 55 accidents every hour. However, the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Act was passed by the Lok Sabha last year, but never got the nod from the Rajya Sabha, which got adjourned indefinitely this year. Meanwhile, a recent report shows that most accidents in India involve “newest vehicles”!…