City: Bengaluru

Kala has a beautiful garden outside her house that she wants to protect from pests. She wants to improve her garden and grow lots of fruits and vegetables out there. She came here to learn this "the Organic way".Like Kala, many other people from Bangalore attended the Organic Terrace Gardening (OTG) workshop held at Vittal Mallya Scientific Research Foundation (VMSRF), in BTM Layout II stage. VMSRF is an organisation dedicated to biotechnology research to generate newer products and processes in the field of health-care and agriculture. Palak grown in Organic terrace garden. Pic: Anisha NairAloe Vera at OTG. Pic: Anisha…

The auto fares in Bengaluru have been revised as on 12 March, 2012. Are the auto drivers happy? No! Neither are the commuters. Around 2.5 years ago the minimum fare used to be Rs 14 and the Auto LPG gas price was Rs 37.33 per litre and now when the gas costs around Rs 49 per litre, the minimum auto fare still remains Rs 20.But fare hike is not the only issue here. Auto drivers refuse rides all the timeThe auto drivers toil and work hard but most manage meagre earning of Rs 250 a day. The commuters however think…

Situated beside the Ramanjaneya Temple in Hanumantha Nagar, this auditorium was gathering dust until three years ago. Today, it is a sought after auditorium for theatre groups. Pic: Deepthi M S A few years ago, P D Sathish Chandra, actor and a part of the theatre group Pradarshana Kala Samsthe (Pra.Ka.Sam.), a non-profit arm unit of Fourth Corner communication consultants, was looking out for a theatre. He had six plays in the pipeline, and needed an auditorium.He then spotted an auditorium built by the BBMP, which was in a bad state, in Hanumantha Nagar. He got BBMP to lease the…

The high court ruling prohibiting commercial enterprises in areas designated as residential neighbourhoods, has very important implications for all of us, whether we are property owners, tenants, business people, or retired senior citizens. Where just one RWA (Residents Welfare Association) and 12 individuals of the city joined hands to go to court against the rampant commercialisation of residential areas in the metropolis, there should have been in fact, several thousand supporters and joint-petitioners, given the city's population of over 60 lakhs. File pic. Meera K Consider this example - 8-F main and 27th cross in Jayanagar's third block used to…

The recently concluded National Masters Athletic Championships held at Kanteerava stadium , in the last week of Febraury, served to highlight several challenges stunting the growth of sports in India as well as avenues for improvement of the state of sports in India and not just for Masters athletes. Particpants at the NMAC. Pic: Anju K P For one, there were very few people who knew about the event in the country, let alon ein Bangalore. The fact that a copy of the event schedule was not available till the first day of the meet didn't aid matters. The Masters…

Nature is sometimes only as far away as one's window! Here's the view from an apartment balcony: I can see four kinds of trees. Pic: Deepa Mohan One can see the roads and transport and one can also see four different types of trees in the picture.Framing the photograph at right and left, are some of the most common trees in India, the coconut palm. What a wonderful tree it is, with every part of it being useful to us...the palm fronds used for thatches, brooms and pandals for auspicious occasions; the coconuts being useful as one of the few…

The residents of National Games Village (NGV) see no hopes of respite from the problems of the Storm Water Drain (SWD) beside their colony.The construction of a wall for the SWD system in NGV, which started around a year back, is yet to complete. Workers working on the wall of SWD in NGV. Pic: Anisha Nair Ravinder Sharma, a resident of NGV says, "We face the problem of foul smell and garbage getting collected there on a daily basis since years," the once closed drains were also opened last year due to water clogging. He further added, "... they have…

Nirmala H S, 38, a HSR Layout-resident has always been interested in gardening but had never been able to pursue it. That changed recently when she started volunteering at an organic community gardening initiative in JP Nagar. This is a 50x80 plot of land or ‘patch' located midst prime real estate on 17th Main Road on JP Nagar II phase. Pic: Jyothi Nagaraj Nirmala and a number of other volunteers are together growing tomatoes, chillies, radish, coriander, dhantu soppu, and other produce at the patch now. "When I grew up in Davanagere, in central Karnataka, I watched my father and…

The word ‘antibiotic‘ means a process by which life could be used to destroy life. It comes from the word antibiosis, a term coined in 1889 by Louis Pasteur's pupil Paul Vuillemin. Antibiotics are essentially chemicals secreted by bacteria, fungus and other microorganisms to inhibit the growth of other organisms. Antibiotics are panacea for all diseases.They are effective only against certain infections. I can recover faster from cold and cough with antibiotics.Most cold and cough are viral and antibiotics do not kill viruses.Antibiotics are relatively safe.People have died due to wrongly administered antibiotics.Mild infection: I can buy any antibiotic over…

There's been plenty of loss felt at the cutback on trees due to Bengaluru's rapid expansion. Equally, there has also been anger felt at the enthusiasm of city authorities to build all over the city and uproot trees, virtually at will, on questionable projects. Bengaluru's ‘Garden city' tag has thus been under a cloud for a while now, especially for new comers who only find a city jammed with traffic and dust-laden air. Citizens have tried to hit back. While the most evident form has been increasing protests and action at the High Courts, another movement has been quietly mushrooming.…