Articles by Vaidya R

Mallathahalli Lake has been in the news the past week, but for all the wrong reasons. There are plans set in motion to “develop” the lake, converting it into nothing short of an amusement park, with the main waterbody forming a sorry backdrop. Despite clear guidelines from the courts and the NGT on how to work around lakes, there are plans to build structures inside the lake. I live close to this lake and regularly go for walks by the lake. Life in and around the lake has always been in profusion, slowing me down on these walks. So it…

During the first week of June 2021, the daily bulletin from the Department of Health and Family Welfare(DHFW), Karnataka, was still reporting 300+ COVID deaths per day for Bengaluru Urban district. The corresponding daily positives was around 3500-4000. The general feeling was that the worst was over and things had eased up. But these numbers suggested otherwise, a fatality rate of close to 10%! A closer look at the "DOD" (Date of Death) column of Annexure-2 of the bulletins, however, showed that a lot of these 300+ COVID deaths were being back-counted from May, and some even from April. For…

Rains this year caused extensive damage in some areas. Pic: BBMP Commissioner/Facebook Towards October end, we saw heavy rains in different parts of Bengaluru – predominantly in the south and southwest – which led to flooding of many low-lying areas. Those rains have now given way to pleasant sunny days with partly-cloudy skies. It almost feels like winter is here.  How have the rains been this year? Flooding episodes in the last few months seem to indicate rains were in excess, but were they?  Rainfall was indeed in excess, but also erratic  The Long Period Average(LPA) annual rainfall for Bengaluru is 986mm…

In the last few months, Bengaluru has seen rapid changes in its COVID tally. What's the current situation in the city? Are cases likely to reduce? Are death rates really reducing? Following are some key takeaways based on an analysis of data from the last few months. Number of positive cases per day has been decreasing Bengaluru seems to have hit the highest per-day cases on October 8, with 5121 cases. Since then, per-day case count has been on a decreasing trend. Considering previous seven days' average data, we reached the peak on October 12 and cases have been reducing…

This July, the BWSSB (Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewerage Board) had warned that Cauvery water supply to the city would stop by September. Rainfall was extremely low, and water levels in the Cauvery reservoirs had plummeted. But come August, the scenario turned around completely. The two-and-half months of monsoon this year has been strange. In July end, while compiling the storage levels across all four Cauvery reservoirs in Karnataka - Harangi, Kabini, Hemavathi and KRS - I found that we were staring at the lowest water levels this decade! As the KSNDMC (Karnataka State Natural Disaster Monitoring Centre) does not…

It has been two years since the Metro was launched between Mysore Road and Byappanahalli. Since the day it opened, it has been my main transport to get to work. So much so that I can’t think of any other way of commuting to work! The issue since then has always been the last mile, the last 6kms from the station to the office. I decided to go with BMTC and the results have been mixed. On mornings, it would take anywhere between 20 mins and 45 mins for that distance, not considering traffic. Evenings, it took anywhere from 25…

Mysore Bank at the Mysore Bank Circle is a thing of past - it's going to be just State Bank henceforth! Pic: Malempati Ravi/ Google Local Guides After 104 years, the name State Bank of Mysore was relegated to history. “Mysore Bank” which held a place of pride among Bengalureans no longer exists. There won’t be any boards dotting the city with the blue symbol. And like with many establishments, the name will continue to live on in Bengaluru, hiding in plain sight among other spots of history – in the city’s bus stops and junctions. The latter cannot be…

On any normal weekday morning, if you take a peek into Google maps with Traffic on, and zoom into the East of Bengaluru, you can see some dark lines forming around Tin Factory. This gets input from two green lines – the Old Madras Road and the Outer Ring Road from Kalyan Nagar. The ORR from Kalyan Nagar used to be a mess, but these days things seem to be in some sort of control. This dark line extends all the way till the KR Puram Railway station, becoming green again as traffic rushes out from that point, like kids…

Newspapers announced with glee and celebrated the news that the Metro construction between Silk Board and KR Puram was going to go ahead and will be “fast tracked”. On Twitter, corporate honchos part of the Bengalulru Blueprint Group, congratulated the government for taking the decision. Source: https://twitter.com/kiranshaw/status/776241398622228480 But it was with a fair degree of alarm and shock that the already harassed lot that commutes to the Outer Ring Road read the news. According to this news, Metro Phase 2 construction in this region would now be from Byappanahalli till KR Puram (that line will continue towards Whitefield). Then from KR…

Another year, another bandh. It feels like 1991 all over again. Those empty roads, those days of being at home on weekdays, having to converse with parents in Kannada outside home. But yes, 1991 was definitely worse. There was news of people moving back to Tamil Nadu weeks before the final order. There was a build up. When the final verdict came and cities erupted, there was a sense of inevitability to it. Then there were shoot-at-sight orders and cops milling in front of the house in Chamarajpet. We camped on the terrace, more curious than worried – at 11 you had a…