City: Bengaluru

What can history teach us? I am often asked this seemingly old yet enduring question, in various ways: Why should we study old buildings? Why worry about people who lived long ago? The oft repeated quote, "Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it" is obviously not a sufficient answer one can offer. In this article, I draw on Donald Anderson’s biography ‘The Last White Hunter’ by Joshua Mathew to address this question. Donald Anderson (1934 – 2014), belonged to the last of four generations of Scots who made India their home. I was taken aback…

The Bicycle is the simplest solution to the world's most complex problems. As Chris Broadman says in The Guardian, “Pick a crisis and you’ll probably find cycling is a solution”. Cities across the world, including Italy and Spain which have registered high COVID fatalities, are enabling cycling in these troubled times. Berlin, Bogota, Auckland, Budapest, Mexico City are rolling out “emergency” cycleways to boost bicycle use during the COVID pandemic, besides planning an increase in their city’s permanent cycling network. Calgary, Vancouver, Oakland, Philadelphia, Denver, Minneapolis, have opened up some streets only for cycling and walking. In New York, San…

Women workers will be among those worst-affected by the Karnataka government’s notification that allows factories to increase work hours to 10 per day, or 60 per week. In a survey conducted jointly by us at the Alternative Law  Forum and the Garments Mahila Karmikara Munnade between May 16 and 18, 65% of workers said they won't and can't work for longer hours. Given that an overwhelming segment of the workforce in garment industries are women, extending their work hours will likely result in thousands of women dropping out of the workforce or being asked to leave if they can't work…

Migrant labourers suffer as BIEC shuts down Since Monday night, over 3,000 migrant labourers walked to BIEC (Bangalore International Exhibition Centre) but were not allowed in. Instead, they were made to board buses and dropped off back to the areas they had come from. Most buses were packed and did not follow the norms of mandatory sanitisers or the limit of 30 passengers per vehicle. K V Sharath Chandra, IGP, Central Range, said BIEC was meant to be a temporary shelter for those walking to their hometowns in north India, but that more people were coming in, thinking they'd be…

Over the last few weeks, the sight of garbage pickers and their trucks plying on empty streets in the early mornings has taught us the value of poor migrant labourers who provide essential services in our metros.  From the relative comfort of middle-class homes, we have learnt about their lives and have been moved by their plight.  But, there is another aspect of their predicament, which became clear to me only when I began supplying essential drugs and food packets to their families.  For some years, my friends and I, as volunteers of the Aam Aadmi Party, had held health…

On May 18, Minister of Railways, Piyush Goyal appealed to migrant workers to stay where they were, as the railways planned to double the number of Shramik Trains to 400 per day in two days. He also said that an additional 200 non-AC trains would be operational by June 1. While this increased capacity is a welcome sign, will it be enough to service Bengaluru's stranded workers? A large number of Bengaluru's workers are walking thousands of kilometres to their home states, as the efforts of the governments to arrange transportation has fallen short of the exploding demand. "The Labour…

https://soundcloud.com/citizenmatters/ep4-lessons-from-bengaluru-cm In the concluding episode of our podcast series 'Lessons from Bengaluru', we explore how Bengaluru came to have a unique, vibrant citizen activism scene. While activism was a preserve of the few earlier, this changed since the 2000s as the city started facing more challenges. And now we have citizen activists holding authorities accountable on anything from infrastructure projects like steel flyover, to ward-level governance. Pravir Bagrodia and Srinivas Alavilli from two citizen collectives - Whitefield Rising and Citizens for Bengaluru (CfB) respectively - discuss how their groups came into being and what they have been working on. While…

Based on orders by the Centre's Ministry of Home Affairs on May 17, Karnataka government issued an order on lockdown measures applicable in the state till May 31. Here are the key highlights, as summarised by the Bangalore Apartments' Federation (BAF). Lockdown to continue with relaxations Lockdown will continue till May 31. However, this phase of lockdown is characterised by reasonable relaxations that would support day-to-day life coming back to normal, while certain high-risk activities would be restricted. Intra-city public transport to resume Local public transport mediums (except Metro rail) like BMTC buses, cabs (driver + 2 passengers) and autos…

https://soundcloud.com/citizenmatters/ep3-lessons-from-bengaluru-cm Look at Lalbagh Botanical Garden and Cubbon Park, and it’s easy to see why Bengaluru once claimed the title of 'Garden City'. Rapid, unplanned urbanisation has drastically reduced the city's green cover. Raj Bhagat, who works at the World Research Institute office here in Bengaluru, explains the history of the city's loss of natural vegetation as seen through data. Though Bengaluru still has several thousands of trees, these are mostly alien species. Natural vegetation, which is critical in terms of transpiration cycles, weather patterns, etc is completely absent here except for some sections of protected forests, says Raj. Several…

With lockdown relaxations, BMTC (Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation) and KSRTC (Karnataka State Road Transport Corporation) have just resumed services. Following is a press release from BMTC on how their bus services will be run in the present circumstances. In view of providing safe and convenient transport facility, and to create a sense of trust among passengers by ensuring required cleanliness and hygiene in buses, the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) has planned to operate buses as per the guidelines of the central and state governments. Service availability Initially, operations will be resumed on high-density routes in Bengaluru city except in…