City: Bengaluru

Rainbow Drive Layout, Bhoomi Network for Sustainable Living and Biome Environmental Solutions had together organised a talk by Dr Chandrashekar from Vision Earthcare on May 30th 2010 at the Rainbow Drive Club House on Sarjapur Road. Dr Chandrashekar articulated the limitations of existing STPs and how an ecological method which is Soil Biotechnology (SBT) based STPs, researched for over two decades at IIT-Bombay, provides clean river quality water at a lower cost. Vision Earthcare, incubated in IIT Bombay, has licensed this method for deployment globally. Attendees of the talk included ex-panchayat leaders, active citizens from several layouts, chemical and environment…

The Karnataka High Court dismissed the petition against the proposed national military memorial to be constructed at the Indira Gandhi musical fountain park. The verdict, pronounced by a division bench comprising of Justices Manjula Chellur and Mohan Shantagoudar, on June 4th, said that the proposed war memorial is in the interest of the public and a matter of pride for the citizens of Bengaluru. The bench also said that the National Military Memorial Trust, under the chairmanship of the Chief Minister, will take care of the project. Work at the war memorial site was halted in May this year, after…

Take today’s news (June 3, 2010). Two reports are highlighted, one about Bangalore’s horrendous road fatalities (second highest in the country after Delhi, with over 860 deaths annually, and over 6,100 injured) and the other about a wall collapse that killed a 17-year-old girl. The compound wall had been built by the BBMP just three months ago. The girl had taken shelter next to it as it was raining, and the wall collapsed, crushing her underneath. Bad enough. But what is outrageous is the lack of accountability – the BBMP had parcelled out the work of erecting a short stretch…

In the special BBMP council session on water more than two weeks ago, Chickpet corporator A N Shivkumar (BJP) complained about the number of unauthorised water connections in his ward. He requested Mayor S K Nataraj (BJP) and BWSSB Chairman P B Ramamurthy to look into the matter. Is the Cauvery water you use metered? Pic: Vaishnavi Vittal This complaint comes well in time as just last month on April 16th 2010, the state assembly* passed an amendment to the BWSSB Act, 1964. Section 108 (a) of this Act is with regard to theft of water which is a punishable…

In response to a Right to Information (RTI) application that was filed by RTI-activist M V K Anil Kumar, the state government's Department of Town and Country Planning responded to a question on what the procedure is to appoint various town planners in the town planning department, BDA, BBMP and other civic bodies.These rules are as per the Karnataka Town Planning Department Services (Recruitment) Rules, 1996. For the post of Director of Town Planning, the method of recruitment is only through promotion from the cadre of Joint Director of Town Planning. For this a person must possess a post-graduate degree…

At Casa Ansal apartments on Bannerghata Road, JP Nagar, we got samples of the following drinking water sources tested from a reputed water testing laboratory. Cauvery water as received from BWSSB Water from the open well near A- Block Water from the open well near D- Block Water from borewell near B- block This is what we inferred from the test results: None of the samples meet the Indian standard specifications for drinking water. The Cauvery water sample is the worst of the lot. It contains the highest MPN (Most probable number of Bacteria count) The water from the other…

Sixteen-year-old Hasina Begum, a student of Magadi Government Girls High School in Bengaluru is entering a crucial year in school, the tenth standard. This is just her third year in school. Hasina used to work as a domestic help before she was rescued by the Association for Promoting Social Action (APSA), a Bangalore-based grassroots community development organisation. Underprivileged children who study at APSA's Kanasina Shale, located in LB Shastri Nagar. Pic: Vaishnavi Vittal Hasina studied and prepared for her seventh standard exams at APSA's Dream School or Kanasina Shale, where formal education is imparted to child labourers and children from…

We residents of JP Nagar have seen articles pertaining to requests for BMTC services in the newspapers. During the "Know your Candidates" BBMP election debate organised by Citizen Matters, some participants also raised the same concern.I invite all like-minded residents of JP Nagar to come together and form a forum to jointly voice our concerns to BMTC. A large group will have strength and voice. Contact me at 9916781877.   ⊕

Bangalore Environment Trust has come out with a position paper on the widening of 91 roads in general and six core inner city roads in particular. Bangalore Environment Trust (BET), founded in 1987, works on environment issues concerning the city. Our point is that there is a case for a relook at this 91 roads programme based on various traffic measures being taken by the government like Metro, Monorail, underpasses etc. In any case, we feel that six heritage roads with a large number of old trees must not be widened, but instead various other measures to expedite traffic must…

To the casual observer, power cuts in the city have been erratic and without warning, however, BESCOM officials say these are very much scheduled.Three months ago, on February 25th 2010, BESCOM issued a notification on when there will be power cuts for domestic, commercial and industrial feeders. This was in view of the upcoming summer season. The notification had said that there will be two hours of power cuts everyday in batches – one hour in the morning and one hour in the afternoon. For example, power is cut off in an area between 7 and 8 am in the…