Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK) headed by actor-turned-politician C Joseph Vijay emerged as the single largest party in the recent Tamil Nadu assembly election. Launched in 2024, the debutant party won 108 of the available 234 seats, and secured power after gaining post-election support from Congress, Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), Viduthalai Chiruthaigal Katchi (VCK), CPI, CPI (M) and some rebel All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) MLAs. Vijay was sworn in as the Chief Minister on May 10. In Chennai, TVK’s tally was an impressive 18 of 20 seats.  A leading star testing political waters and finding success has…

Last year around the same time, Citizen Matters published a two part series on how the National Clean Air Program (NCAP) funds were underutilised in Bengaluru. Following this, budget allocation sped up and last September, the state government allocated over ₹145 crore to various agencies. However the air quality in the city hasn't improved, while more than ₹100 crores of the clean air funds remain unused. A total of ₹541 crore has been released so far, with ₹147.7 crore recently allocated among BESCOM, BMTC, BSWML, the Horticulture Department, and the Climate Action Cell. The planned projects for these clean air…