Blogs

It is not a common occurrence for me to be able to watch a well-made promo video of a theatre school; I did that for the first time when I reached out to the Drama School Mumbai, and the programme coordinator, Neeraj Panchal, sent me the video, which you can see here I noticed the words "Annual Student Production 2018-19" on the excellent brochure that was given out before, and about, the play This intrigued me and I found out that the play was staged by the students of this school; some of them told me, after the play, that…

The Honourable Chief Minister Shri H D Kumaraswamy has responded to the citizens’ protest on March 16th demanding public consultations and #TenderRadduMaadi. This represented the interests of a large number of people, including over 60 organisations. His response was both swift and spontaneous, and at very short notice, he met with citizen representatives. He patiently listened to various points of view at the meeting and offered his own comments in the discussion with Leo Saldanha of ESG, Prof Ashish Verma of IISc, Prakash Belawadi, Naresh Narasimhan, Vinay Sreenivasa of Bengaluru Bus Prayaneekara Vedike (BBPV), Zibi Jamal of Whitefield Rising, and…

"Two years ago", all of us came together to oppose the steel flyover that threatened to ruin our city. Your support in the form of physical presence at human chain and resolutions passed in your organization played a critical role in successfully stopping that. Now we have a much bigger battle ahead of us as the 100kms elevated corridor looms upon us. The old steel flyover is also part of it in the concrete avatar! We need to come together once again and we request your help. As you might know, we were expecting a notice for public consultation ever…

Since all of us are becoming so polarized by caste these days, I thought I would take a tongue-in-cheek look at the four varnas, or castes, into which I can categorize the living beings around us. No offence meant, this is a light-hearted classification, intended to drive home the point that dividing ourselves by "caste" is not a good thing to do! The Brahmins of the "upper caste" is easily represented as there are several creatures with the word in their name. Here is the Brahminy Kite: See the beauty of the Brahminy Skink: There is also the Brahminy Myna…

"The Emperor of All Maladies", a Pulitzer-winning book by Siddharth Mukherjee, is an intense book about that dreaded "C" word...cancer, and looks at the dread ailment via multiple lenses...history, biography, describing the several discoveries, obstacles,triumphs and failures in humanity's long journey with, and battle against, cancer. To base a play on a book like this is a major challenge, and Bangalore Little Theatre rose up to that challenge with their play, which I watched at Ranga Shankara on the 27th of February, '19. The theatre group had produced an excellent brochure, which described the play. I skimmed through it, wanting…

It had been quite a while since I went to Ranga Shankara for a play, and the blurb about "Bali" was interesting enough to pull me in. Here's the quotation from the excellent brochure that was handed out before the play: "Adishakti's Bali is a retelling of the various events that lead up to the battle between Bali and Ram and eventually, the death of Bali. The play explores the notion of right and wrong, and how it may change when each and every character is given an opportuntiy to voice their thoughts and opinions." With this intriguing introduction, I…

In an earlier post, I wrote about the rise of the citizen entrepreneurs. Thought I’ll share why these active citizens do what they do. I am including myself in this club because I still volunteer occasionally. Many of our team members are engaged in their own local issues (but we ensure that is independent of our work at Citizen Matters!).  Satisfaction First of course, is the immediate sense of empowerment — that we get when we start doing something. Whether or not there are results to show. Sometimes there is a feeling of being better than the rest, because hey,…

Each year, when the state Budget is presented, the citizens of Namma Bengaluru hope to see things included in it which will alleviate the many challenges we face. And over time, dashed hopes have led to lower expectations. But this year, I'm happy to see something new - for the first time we have promised ourselves a comprehensive approach to problems rather than piece-meal solutions through projects. The decongestion of traffic in the city will require a broad emphasis on all modes, with meaningful investments in sustainable mobility and public transport. The bus fleet needs to be doubled, we'll need…

For a while now, the world of insects and spiders has begun to be revealed to everyone, through the medium of photography. As the micro-sized creatures are captured through macro photography, stunningly weird-looking creatures appear on social media feeds, making us feel that these, surely, are beings from a different planet! No, these creatures are not "out of this world" at all. It's just that their tiny size prevents us from seeing them in detail. Another reason why we know little about them is that they are often so well camouflaged, as leaves, bark, or other natural phenomena, that we…

In a symbolic gesture, more than 300 residents of all age groups and from all corners of Bengaluru assembled this morning to inaugurate an initiative: #ಮರಹತ್ಯೆತಡೆಯೋಜನೆ (MaraHatyeThadeYojane (Project Stop tree felling)) Srinivas Alavilli, co founder of Citizens for Bengaluru said “This yojane is in response to the marking Of 144 trees on Bellary Road by KRDCL. KRDCL seems to be making preparations for cutting these trees for elevated corridor project. However, environmental impact assessment(EIA) has not been done and environmental clearance has not been granted for this project. Due process was not followed and public consultation not held in violation…