CITIZEN JOURNALISM

Pride Apartments Owners Association situated at Bilekhalahalli, opposite to State Bank of Mysore, Bannerghatta road planted 59 saplings on the way to their apartment and within their compound on January 9th, in collaboration with Trees for free, a non-profit that takes up tree planting initiatives, and sponsored by Yahoo, the technology firm, and the Rotary club of Koramangala. 59 tree saplings planted in front of Pride apartments. Pic: Sangeetha Ramakrishnan. Each plant is adopted by a child of the apartment complex. This will make them “aware about the value of trees in our environment”, explains Minu Mehra, joint secretary of…

A few weeks ago, we, the residents of Brigade Millennium apartments in JP Nagar were alarmed to notice red markings on the external walls of the Millennium Avenue. These were the indications of the now familiar road widening plans of BBMP. On further investigation, we uncovered a notification (Notification No EE/MR[SE]/PR/04/09-10 dated 3-8-09, Road widening Bommanahalli Zone) of which we were previously unaware. Marking like this are found all along Millennium Avenue Brigade Millennium is a unique campus, the first of its kind, which was formed by BDA. It was developed by Brigade Enterprises Ltd as a group housing scheme,…

The monthly first Saturday meeting of Manjari Ladies Association (a registered  non-profit social service organisation) which is based in JP Nagar was a special one to ring in the New Year on a joyous note.  All serious discussions were put aside and it was fun and gaiety all afternoon. Ladies dressed in their colourful best enjoyed and participated in the jokes, music, games, skits and so on. The icing on the cake was the humorous Kannada skit  "Sanmaana Sukha", enacted by some of the committee members and very ably directed by Savithri Chayapathi, the secretary of the association. Parimala Rao…

A science exhibition on a 16 coach AC train! Yes, “The Science express”, a science exhibition on a train that is travelling all over the country is now in Bangalore. The exhibits have been developed by the Max Planck Society, Germany, in collaboration with the Department of Science and technology (DST), the Government of India and the Vikram A Sarabhai Community Science Centre (VASCSC).The train is in Bangalore, stationed at the Cantonment station, from the 10th to the 14th of this month. So far the train has visited over 100 cities covering a distance of 32000 kms. An exhibit at…

Past Saturday, December 5th saw a bunch of metal heads from the garden city of Bengaluru become a part of history by default. History because they witnessed India’s first ever international metal festival for climate change; default for the simple reason that there was absolutely no talk about climate change on stage. However, NGO heavyweights like Green Peace, Indian Youth Climate Network and Life did their bit by setting up stalls and signing petitions about climate change. These petitions will eventually be sent to a United Nations Climate Change Conference in 2010. At last count, a total of fifteen hundred…

We all appreciate the planned approach and systematic execution of any project. Many companies do it and among government establishments, the railways, perhaps because it was a British company earlier. For example, if they have to bridge a river of 50 feet and lay the track, they just refer to ready made designs and drawings for bridge girders, fabricate them while the piers are being built, and finish the project in record time. Civic amenities site in Kalyan Nagar is lying vacant for over two decades and is in continuous danger of being encroached upon. Pic: Lina Vincent. We also…

The birth centenery of Prof.V T Srinivasan, who was one of the founders of Bangalore High School and Vijaya College falls in the year 2012. Prof. V T Srinivasan was born in the year 1912. His ancestors hailed from Vengalathur, North Arcot District and the place is located near Kanchipuram. His father was V T Ekambarem, who served as a Tahsildar in Cuddapah, Andhra Pradesh and his mother was Kamakshi. He studied in Madras Christian College and in Annamalai University.Along with K Srinivasa Rao and K Lakshminarayana Rao, Srinivasan started The Bangalore High School, which soon became well known for…

Last night, I was returning from the house of a friend. We were a group of six, and all sober. We realised that a few in our group were hungry, and headed to Paramount in Koramangala for dinner. The time was around midnight, and the cops were at the door ensuring that no impressionable, upright citizen was enticed into the den of vice.. Oh sorry, they serve only food! The moral indignation of the police was to be seen to be believed. I understand the concern behind having bars/pubs open late. But I cannot for the life of me understand…

Saturday, November 14th 2009 saw a different kind of Children's day event in Jayanagar. Kids were not dressed as Nehru or Indira Gandhi and were not singing or dancing. Instead, they all came out on their cycles and demanded safer roads for cycling to school.About 200 students from various schools in Jayanagar, including MES school, Good Shepherd school, JSS school, Vijaya school were joined by Transport Minister R Ashoka, Jayanagar, MLA B N Vijayakumar and film actor Pooja Gandhi in a cycle rally. Justice Saldanha also spoke on  rights of children in roads and urban spaces. On Children's day around…

Life throws pleasant surprises along the way when you least expect it. Until Friday afternoon I hadn’t really planned on attending the launch of Yt’angle (Yours Truly angle for children by the theatre group Yours Truly). But one thing led to another and me, a reluctant theatre enthusiast jumped at the chance of introducing my children to theatre. They were not entirely enthusiastic about this last minute Saturday program to go watch a play when they could be home with video games and television. The chock-a-bloc traffic and losing our way to JC Road didn’t help either. But we reached…