EDITORS' PICK

ஆடி அழைக்கும், தை விரட்டும் is an adage in Tamil. The essence of the saying is that every year, starting mid-July and for the next six months, it is a festive season, culminating in Pongal that comes in mid-January. This is the time when a range of festivals bring people together in celebration. Festivals revive and reinforce cultural traits. Togetherness with friends and relatives instills a sense of camaraderie, strengthens personal bonds and helps us build a support system for life. The ambience during festivals and the rituals or practices of each vary from one festival to another and adds variety,…

Patriotism has 3 colours – and green is one of them! So let our celebrations be green! That is the key message of the introductory poster of the #GreenPatriot series we put out this week through Beautiful Bengaluru – a citizens’ initiative which focuses on clean, green, safe living. Our extended name Beautiful Bharat for campaigns of national relevance brings more focus to an important subject for the whole country. With each passing festival and event, there is an urgency to focus on what we can simplify, do better, how we can go greener, and most of all, how our…

Within a few days of the imposition of the nationwide lockdown in end March, the prices of fruits and vegetables rose perceptibly. As Chennai depends heavily on other districts in Tamil Nadu and other states for its supply of these foods, travel restrictions impacted the transportation leading to the price rise. The pandemic has strongly underlined the need for Chennai to be self-reliant. But how can the city attain that self-sustainability? ‘Who feeds Chennai?’, a body of research conducted by the Urban Design Collective (UDC) -- a collaborative platform for participatory planning to create liveable cities -- during the lockdown,…

Delhi has no COVID war room. But the capital had become the centre of attention in the fight against COVID-19 when on June 9th, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia estimated that Delhi, groaning under an acute shortage of hospital beds, would need over 5.5 lakh beds by end July. A shocked public, the city administration, hospitals and even Union Home Minister Amit Shah stepped in. The BJP at the Centre and AAP in Delhi called a truce as they joined hands to deal with what was becoming a crisis in the capital. Their crisis management efforts finally yielded some positive results. At 10.25…

As Tamil Nadu went into a total lockdown on March 24th, many individuals in the city found themselves helpless and in dire need of assistance. From migrant workers looking to get back to their hometowns to senior citizens who resided by themselves, the lockdown impacted scores. The situation would have been several times worse had not NGOs, civil society organisations and some individuals taken it upon themselves to come to the aid of those affected. Thus, when a migrant worker stuck in Chennai with his family and twins, just a few months old, ran out of milk and supplies for…

Kulsum Khatun and husband, a rickshaw puller, are residents of Jagdamba camp in Sheikh Sarai. Over the last few months of lockdown in the capital, none of them were able to find any work. “My two daughters, aged 7 and 9, study in a government school in Malviya Nagar (South Delhi),” said Kusum, “Mid-day meals were very important for us since we hardly make enough to feed them twice a day. Now, even that has stopped. We received around Rs 95 in March but nothing since then.” On March 23rd, seven days after the COVID crisis forced closure of all…

In Part 1 of this series, we found that despite government's claims, Bengaluru has only about 3,500 hospital beds dedicated for COVID treatment. In this part, we explore why private hospitals have not complied with the government orders to give up beds and treat COVID patients. In a recent webinar on COVID, Viswa Mohan Tripahi, a resident of Mantri Alpyne apartment, narrated their ordeal trying to find a hospital bed for another resident who had developed symptoms. "The person's oxygen levels were dropping fast. They dropped to the 80s and we couldn't find a hospital for treatment. Everyone was asking…

Kempegowda tower, now located in a park near Raman Research Institute. Pic courtesy: Raman Research Institute Karnataka government recently announced a Rs 111-crore project dedicated to Bengaluru's founding father Kempe Gowda. The project included Rs 70 crores for a statue of the 16th-century chieftain at the Kempegowda International Airport, and Rs 41 crores for the ‘beautification’ of his tomb that was recently discovered in Magadi.  The project understandably came under fire given that we are among the states hit worst by COVID-19.  But the argument presented by the powers-to-be in the public domain was that the project was meant to…

Vaishnavi Bhardwaj’s ‘school’ is her dadi’s pooja room. And her classroom is her Dadi’s smartphone. Every Monday-Friday, 9-year-old Vaishnavi is ready to ‘go to school’ by 9 am. Her mother Rashi makes sure that the fourth standard student at a private school in East Delhi has all the required text books and note books ready in time for her morning class prayer, signalling the beginning of her day in school.  Schools in the capital began for the new academic session on July 1st with technology driven classes over the Internet and on television. Private school students like Vaishnavi, every morning wear…

Since COVID cases started surging in Bengaluru, we've heard of several reports of patients not finding hospital beds or being denied treatment. Most recently, even a COVID doctor at Chikkamudavadi PHC (Primary Health Centre) in Ramanagara district, Dr Manjunath S T, succumbed to the virus after being turned away by three Bengaluru hospitals. Despite this, the government has maintained that there are enough COVID beds in the city. Towards the end of June, government had ordered that half the beds in all private hospitals would be reserved for COVID patients. On July 7, Dr K Sudhakar, Minister of Medical Education,…