bengaluru news

Rotary Bangalore Palmville in association with Bangalore Political Action Committee (B.PAC) today organized an award ceremony to give away My Place of Pride Awards 2017. My Place of Pride is an initiative to recognize eco-friendly communities in Bengaluru city and encourage sharing of best practices and motivate people to adopt sustainable practices. The contest was for the following categories: The Contesting communities were evaluated on the following: Self declaration Polling Physical inspection 102 communities comprising over 200,000 citizens across the city registered for the contest. 57 communities made it to the second shortlist base on their Self – Declaration submissions detailing…

Bengaluru is almost entirely dependent on the state of Karnataka for its electricity supply; nothing wrong in with that in appearance. However, inability of the state to respond consistently to the city’s power demands coupled with the failure to diversify its power generation sources impose a large hurdle on the city’s competitiveness and quality of life. BESCOM, the institution responsible for power distribution in eight districts of Karnataka including Bengaluru Urban and Rural, accounts for almost half of the state’s total demand out of which 2,400 MW are reserved for Bengaluru. With a total electricity demand of about 7,000 MW…

The Bengaluru Bus Prayanikara Vedike and Citizens for Bengaluru met the Chief Minister Siddaramaiah on Monday, demanding Bus Bhagya in the upcoming State Budget. He listened to our demands on 'Halve the Fares and Double the Fleet' and has agreed to consider our demands presented in the memorandum along with 'Janara Budget Goshti' conducted yesterday. With the budget coming up on Wednesday, it is important that the State Government considers our demands so that by encouraging public transport traffic congestion can be eased and air pollution reduced. We believe the Congress government can bring significant changes to the city by encouraging ordinary…

The Bengaluru Bus Prayanikara Vedike has launched a joint campaign with Citizens for Bengaluru called the 'Bus Bhagya Beku' campaign, that demands the State Government to provide financial support to BMTC to 'Halve the Fares, and Double the Fleet'. About 50 lakh commuters use BMTC services every day, thus making BMTC the backbone of Bangalore city. And yet, this mode of public transport is highly neglected, and too expensive for many to use. In addition, traffic congestion in Bangalore is caused by private vehicles, especially cars. And we feel that the only solution to reducing such congestion and air pollution…

Citizens for Bengaluru (CfB) and Bengaluru Bus Prayanikara (BBPV) have initiated a public campaign - #BusBhagyaBeku - seeking ‘Half the Fares and Double the Fleet’. CfB and BBPV met with various organisations and conducted commuter surveys at garment factories on Mysore Road and at Shivaji Nagar, Jayanagar TTMCs and at Majestic to understand their concerns and to seek their support for #BusBhagyaBeku. CfB and BBPV, call upon all citizens of Bengaluru to take a bus to Shantinagar TTMC on Saturday 4th March at 11AM (incidentally, the monthly Bus Day) in an expression of support for public transport and ‘#BusBhagyaBeku’ to…

B.PAC submitted its strong objections to BESCOM proposal for increase of electricity tariff for FY-18. T.V. Mohandas Pai, Vice President, B.PAC made the submissions before the commission today during the public hearing conducted by KERC. Following are the highlights of B.PAC’s submissions: Distribution Loss: All divisions/towns in BESCOM with distribution loss above average 15% should be borne by BESCOM and not to be loaded to the consumer. Power purchase: KPCL thermal power supply has reduced significantly to a tune of 2088 MU, BESCOM purchased short term power throughout the year at high price. Rs. 313.4 Cr is the difference amount…

Pic: Praful Residents of Bengaluru might have noticed in the media, that recently the BBMP has commenced issuing notices to many commercial/non-residential establishments in residential areas to shut shop. Whilst this may come across to many as a sudden and arbitrary act by the BBMP, for those conscientious citizens and Residents Welfare Associations (RWA’s) that have spent numerous hours over the years (mostly behind the scenes) seeking to improve the quality of life of the residents of the city, this is only a long overdue first step towards implementing regulations/orders that have stood violated repeatedly for over 5 years right…

After living in one of the most livable cities in the world - Melbourne - I became passionate about the cities’ phenomena. I have strived to discover more active ways to live in a the city, an appetite that has led me to intern with Oorvani Foundation. I chose to study urban governance - a domain echoing its object complexity - at SciencesPo Paris. I find great joy in contemplating the city and hope to use this blog as a place to convey my thoughts over the next six months. Bangalore, or Bengaluru, has doubled in size in about a…

Citizens for Bengaluru (CfB) members Prakash Belawadi, Naresh Narasimhan, Srinivas Alavilli, Tara Krishnaswamy, Priya Chetty Rajagopal, Deepti Sudhindra along with Leo Saldanha (ESG) addressed the media on recent developments with respect to the steel flyover and master plan for Bengaluru. They put on record the following: 1. We are appalled by the recent statements by Hon'ble Minister K J George that 'people who own private jets oppose the steel flyover'. The statement reflects disdain for the concern of citizens who love Bengaluru, more than 2.5 lakhs of whom have emphatically rejected the steel flyover plan - via the human chain…

Wherever BDA shows its Master Plan, there are strong objections to it. People point out that it ... (a) .. is autocratic, having been developed with no input from the people of the city. It is almost as if it is being shown to us after everything is done and dusted, and only to comply with the legal requirement for 'consultations'. (b) ... is ill-conceived. The idea that the existing BDA region can / should support twice the population we now have is foolhardy, besides being environmentally tenuous. (c) ... is unconstitutional, having followed none of the statutory processes for…