CITIZEN JOURNALISM

Valentine’s Day, for all practical purposes, is a commercial creation. The day itself does not bear any deep significance to those who may celebrate it, though the love they celebrate might bear some value. Politically and socially, it is a fluffy construct, and should not require too much inspection. But V-Day is D-day now, as far as women’s rights movements are concerned. The day has grown to be important because it appears that there is now a fight on for the ability to love and express it. Illustration: Shilo Shiv Suleman - this is part of the set created by…

In July 2008, my parents and I boarded a flight from San Francisco International Airport, and arrived twenty-four hours later in Bangalore. Unlike our usual journeys, this one was not a round trip. We were leaving the United States and moving to India for good.We soon settled down in a comfortable, modern apartment somewhere on the outskirts of Bangalore - in an erstwhile village called Bellandur, now part of Greater Bangalore. I had a new house, a new school, and new friends... but most importantly, a new town to explore. Investigate! Explore! Dig! To me, these words conjure up magic.…

Arun Raghavan, an open source software enthusiast, and four friends worked all night on January 19th on a very unique problem. They were scraping electoral data from ceokarnataka's website. They wanted to create a user-friendly frontend for citizens to search their names and polling booth information. They did this as part of a hacknight to commemorate the life and works of Aaron Swartz, on January 19th and 20th organised by HasGeek, an event organiser for geeks. Aaron Swartz was a hacktivist, who died in early January. He had helped create RSS 1.0; contributed to Creative Commons; was an early builder of Reddit, where…

I often wonder whether we are doing justice to our youngsters -- all open spaces are being ornamentally ‘gardened', ‘fountained', 'ticketed' and enclosed with barbed wires that are inaccessable to children. To give one or two concrete examples, there was a nice open space behind the HOPCOMS in Sadashivanagar that is surrounded by houses. There is also a nursery school in that area. I have been a resident in this neighbourhood the past 30 years and it pains me to see all the open spaces being taken away for either allotment to VIPs or converted into ornamental parks with tickets.…

On Saturday, January 26th, I completed the Oxfam Trailwalker for the second successive year. A start to finish 100-km walk by teams of four, it offered me quality time for reflection, 32 hours to be precise.Oxfam India Trailwalker is a team challenge organised to raise funds for Oxfam India, the 61 year old NGO, for its activities that fight poverty and injustice. Our member teams walk (or run) 100 km in less than 48 hours, it is a test of physical endurance requiring mental strength and team spirit.The Second Oxfam India Trailwalker took us through a 100 km trail from…

It's the most awaited year of the day for art enthusiasts in Bangalore, a day our friends and we look forward to every year and plan ahead for. And just as we have done for four of the last five years, this year, too, we were at the Chitra Santhe exhibition organized by and held at the Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath on Sunday, January 27th. Chitra Santhe 2013, Pic: Rudreshwar Sen Most of our friends go for this event with their spouses; art being something that's going to stare back at you every day of your life, it's important to have…

Traffic Warden talks about road safety at Sherwood High School (pic: CMCA)Nearly 130 students from classes 2 to 7 in the age group of 7 years to 12 years of Sherwood High School on Bannerghatta road along with members of the civic club of the Children's Movement for Civic Awareness (CMCA) celebrated the Safety Awareness Walk and Traffic Police Day on 7th January, 2013. Held between 9 and 11 am, the walk started with an inspiring and educative talk by P. R. Rao, Deputy Chief of the Traffic Warden organisation about the importance of road safety. Inspector Diwakar (Traffic) of…

In the last few years, quite a few individual residents in Bangalore have installed solar panels on their rooftops, that produce electricity to power their homes. A small number of these people have also connected their solar systems to the BESCOM grid and there are many others who would like to so too.What is Solar Power?Photovoltaic (PV) panels are ones in which the main operating elements are semiconductor materials like Silicon. When sunlight strikes these panels, electric power output is created which is Direct Current (DC power), like that of a battery. To run home electric equipments, one option would…

Media reports have highlighted the shocking acts of sale of babies by Get Well Hospital, Neelasandra on Friday December 28th, 2012. Reference:  (Times of India, Deccan Herald and The Hindu) This is not the first instance where there has been evidence that this hospital has been involved in child trafficking. There was another sting operation conducted at this hospital by the Ashok Nagar Police Station and APSA in mid 2010, which was also videotaped and shown in the media at that time. YET this hospital and its owners have been functioning with impunity since then with no follow up after…

Earlier in December, the Karnataka High Court issued a judgment saying dogs deemed a menace or seen to cause nuisance can be exterminated by Bangalore authorities whether or not there is evidence of their having mauled or bitten children or adults. An independent dog with collar companion to indigent humans. Chief Justice Vikramjit Sen and Justice B V Nagarathna failed to define the terms "menace" and "nuisance". Bangalore-based voluntary organisation, Voice of Stray Dogs, has made a detailed assessment of the judgment. The lives of the independent dogs in Karnataka's capital would thus depend on arbitrary definitions that may be…