City: Bengaluru

Shankareshwara temple located on the hilltop at Hutridurga. Pic: Akshatha M On a lazy weekend, if you are desperate to escape from the hustle bustle of maddening city crowd and venture into an adventurous yet peaceful excursion, Hutridurga is the place to go. This hill located approximately 60 km away from Bengaluru on Magadi-Kunigal road, offers a refreshing trekking experience, which is reasonably easy even for a first time trekker. Hutridurga, popularly known as Hutribetta among the villagers, is a hill with historical significance. The name Hutridurga is derived from a village named Hutri located near the hill. It is…

To read part I of the series, click here: How C V Raman came to Bangalore The house of Tatas had always hoped to have an Indian director for the institute one day, which was not very feasible in the colonised country. But the opportunity to economise on the weight carried by Raman’s international reputation, by his knighthood and the Nobel Prize, was quickly seized by the Tatas, and for the first time ever since its inception in 1909, an Indian was appointed as the director of IISc in 1933. Many nationalists at that time harboured a feeling that the…

  Bengaluru this week October 29th 2015     CITIZEN MATTERS Bangalore's own interactive newsmagazine Speak up, it's your city!     As a local community media, Citizen Matters makes a small, but significant difference to the lives of Bangaloreans - by reporting about the news that really matters, by featuring the change makers in the city, by giving you a forum to communicate with other like-minded people. We will be launching our biannual fundraiser in a few days and we hope that you will continue to support Oorvani Foundation to enable change. With you by our side, we can continue…

Pic: Sanchayan Nath Bellandur lake—Bengaluru’s largest lake, hits headlines often for all wrong reasons. The once bountiful lake has gradually transformed into a sewage tank. Formation of foam is a cause for concern among the citizens living around. The authorities claim to be doing their best to solve the problem. Fed up with the lethargic attitude of the authorities in solving issue, residents and activists have recently decided to launch a massive campaign to fix the problem once and for all. They say that if this is not sorted out now, it is going to be impossible to continue living…

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is calling on engineers, designers, the scientific and innovation community, persons with disabilities, humanitarians, manufacturers, investors and entrepreneurs to join forces in the ‘Enable Makeathon’ to develop affordable solutions for challenges faced by persons with disabilities in rural areas. Image source: Nihal Kashinath, IoTBLR The Enable Makeathon is a 60-day programme taking place between November 2015 and January 2016. It consists of an ‘Online Track’ for teams from all around the world, and an ‘Onsite Track’ with a series of events in Bengaluru. Teams will work towards finding innovative solutions to nine…

On October 31st 2015, a group of friends will be running from Freedom Park in Bengaluru to Chintamani, near Chikkaballapur. The following day, November 1st, they will make their way back to Bengaluru, once again on foot. Across the two days, they will cover a distance equivalent to that of seven half-marathons (a half-marathon marathon equals 21.097 kilometres). But this is no average run… it is an opportunity to raise funds to support the farmers in Chintamani. Some members of the team that will run during Ride2Light 2.0. Pic: Siddarth Dudheria Citizen Matters spoke to Siddarth Dudheria, a product manager…

In the first part of the series Loans for poor in Bengaluru, we explored how the system of loan from informal sources with high interest rates is pushing the poor deeper into poverty. The second part explored the system of bank loans for poor, to see whether it benefits the poor who don’t have securities. In the third part, we examine how micro-finance institutions function, and what do poor people feel about it. Mariyal, a 33-year-old domestic worker living in Ejipura slum in Bengaluru, has taken a Micro Finance Institution (MFI) loan for the first time. She has borrowed Rs…

Another evening, another Ganesha procession passing by to get to the Mallathahalli tank. It has been more than a month since the Ganesha festival, but the sounds of passing processions—typically a tractor with a massive Ganesha, surrounded by hooting teenage boys, drums in front and more boys (younger and teens) dancing around it—is still not unusual. One of the perks of living close to a lake, I guess. If there are still idols being dumped in the lake, wonder what the situation would have been over the month. The area for dumping is a small pond cut out from the…

  To: Smt. Vandita Sharma, IAS , Principal Secretary, Infrastructure Development Department, GOK Dear Madam, Greetings! Wishing you and your family, a happy Vijayadashmi. I hope your near and dear ones are also celebrating the festival with same fervor and spirits as done in past years. On this very auspicious day and occasion, there are families like parents of Poornima Sundaram, age 17, who died in the accident recently in Majestic Area knocked down by a BMTC bus, who are not celebrating. They are mourning the demise of their loved ones when we are celebrating the victory of good over the…

C V Raman in his classroom. Pic courtesy: Oldindianphotos.in November 2015 marks the 127th birthday, and the 45th year of demise, of Chandrasekhar Venkata Raman, one of the greatest minds produced in the twentieth century. Bengaluru was home to this great mind, nobel laureate who is popular as Sir C V Raman. The city bears many landmarks and institutions in his memory,  such as Raman Research Institute,  Panchavati - C V Raman’s home in Malleshwaram where he lived, and C V Raman Nagar. Born in Thiruvanaikaval near Trichinopoly to Chandrashekar Iyer and Parvathi Ammal on November 7, 1888, Raman was…