City: Bengaluru

Bengaluru is the IT hub of India, and most people here are becoming tech-savvy.  Bengaluru is today a global name, and with the changing stature of the city, the Bengaluru Traffic Police (BTP) too is striving to do its best.  Given the widespread use of technology, BTP has decided to use technology to serve citizens better. BTP frequently receives many complaints against auto drivers from the public—refusal to go on hire, demanding excess fare, misbehaving and other issues—through its various communication channels. In order to address citizens’ problems effectively, BTP has designed, developed and launched a mobile application called bSafe…

Growing up in Bengaluru for me has always revolved around the Cantonment - early morning walks under the tree-lined avenues towards Richards Park, eating Ritchies mutton biryani on MM road (back in the day when a plate was a meagre Rs 40), or buying weekly groceries from Thoms after Sunday mass. Historically, the Cantonment of Bengaluru dates back to the 18th century, specifically 1807, when the British defeated Tipu Sultan’s army and established themselves around the Ulsoor kere. The British established various typologies from large parks and shopping centres to parade grounds and schools, the most important being the colonial bungalow…

As it happens every year, Bengaluru got good amount of money this year too. Here's a look at the details. Bangalore Water Supply and drainage Board The following projects have been approved: • Water Supply and Underground Drainage Project for 110 villages coming under BBMP at a cost of Rs. 5018 crore approved with JICA loan. It includes components to reduce unaccounted for water of 180 MLD. • In addition to existing untreated water main pipeline, scheme for extending additional untreated Water Transfer Pipeline between Forbes Sagar to N.B.R and to extend up to T.K. Halli at an estimated cost…

The public consultations organised tree cutting for Metro Phase II in Bengaluru have been repeatedly cancelled due to lack of data and procedural lapses. Activists who were present in the Metro public consultation on March 11 demanded that the data on planted trees and the trees to be cut be made public. Namma Metro had uploaded the tree cutting data, however there was no map done by Namma Metro. This map has been created using the data provided in the BMRCL website. Click on the individual balloons to see the type of tree and cordinates. Here are the trees to…

In 2014, the Government of Karnataka decided to go for private-public partciipation in maintaining of public places. Freedom Park, Visweswaraiah Museum, Tippu fort, Lalbagh, Cubbon Park aquarium and Venkatappa Art Gallery were in the list of such tourist destinations for Bengaluru Urban. The government also formed a committee with Minister for Tourism as the chairperson, to consider and approve CSR proposals to maintain public places in the list of 46 tourist destinations identified.   // Adoption of Tourist Destination Karnataka Tourism GO (PDF) Adoption of Tourist Destination Karnataka Tourism GO (Text) Related ArticlesMoU between GoK and Tasveer Foundation on Venkatappa…

  // KTVG-Report-2014 (PDF) KTVG-Report-2014 (Text) Related ArticlesMoU between GoK and Tasveer Foundation on Venkatappa Art Gallery

  // VAG-Tasveer-Foundation-GoK-MoU (PDF) VAG-Tasveer-Foundation-GoK-MoU (Text)

  Being a proponent for the Government of Karnataka’s (GoK) decision to ‘Adopt a Destination’ under CSR, one is saddened to see some artists put out misleading and wrong information to ensure that the Venkatappa Art Gallery (VAG) adoption MoU signed between the Government agencies and Tasveer Foundation is cancelled. Terms like ‘brutal, undemocratic takeover’, ‘surreptitious MoU’, ‘usurp public resources’, ‘prime real estate capture’ are being bandied about giving the impression that some of us (who believe that VAG adoption is good for Bengaluru citizens) are descendants of Darth Vader! Bengaluru citizens will gain with this adoption program. We might…

Repair Café is organising its 5th workshop on March 19th 2016. It is being hosted by The Green Path situated at Seshadripuram, from 11.30 am to 4 pm. Apart from repairing and upcycling, other highlights of the workshop include Talk show on Water Conservation by Aditi Hastak from Biome Workshop on basics of Kitchen Gardening Screening of a documentary film, Economics Of Happiness So what is Repair Café?  Repair Café is a community gathering where repairers, volunteers, visitors come together for the purpose of repairing household articles. A repair man busy at work. Pic: Purna Sarkar Since our first Repair…

  Bengaluru this week March 17th 2016     CITIZEN MATTERS Bangalore's own interactive newsmagazine Speak up, it's your city!     Phew, it just seems like yesterday we were reaching out to you, but it is already end of the financial year, and we start our bi-annual fundraiser. We will mail you shortly with details on how to donate. Citizen Matters Journalism Workshop We are happy to announce the workshop for citizen activists, aspiring writer-journalists, or just anybody who wants to write impactfully on issues important to you, and reach out to a larger audience. It will be held on…