GENRE: In Focus

What do a 91 year 'young' activist, and a 40-something marine biologist have in common? A love for this city they call home, and a desire to help its citizens overcome their sense of helplessness in finding solutions to everyday civic problems.. Garbage not cleared? Road being relaid without milling? Storm water drains not cleaned before the monsoon? Electricity cables hanging dangerously in the open? In each of these situations, the solution is at hand. Help is often only a phone call away. But if we ask the average citizen on the road, the most common response will be  -…

Media focus on the fire that broke out and killed four in Mumbai’s residential Mamoon Manzil complex has been less compared to that on the fire tragedy in the same city in the end of December. The cause of the fire in this building is yet to be ascertained but no one would be surprised if it was pinned down to faulty management and violation of rules. Barely a week ago, the Kamala Mills tragedy got the Bruhan Mumbai Corporation (BMC) on its toes, throwing them into panic-stricken knee-jerk reaction: suspending five officials, galvanising authorities, managers, health and medical experts…

Mobility was arguably Bengaluru’s single largest problem in 2017. Even as people grappled with depleting resources of water and land, it was the nightmare of getting from one place to another that took precedence over all else in our psyche. In a city of about 1.1 crore people, Bengaluru officially has close to 70 lakh registered vehicles. This is the second largest vehicle population in the country, coming behind Delhi which leads the way with a little more than a crore vehicles on its street. Mumbai with a population of 20 million has just over 35 lakh vehicles. In Bengaluru…

For months now, motorists have been having a roller coaster ride on Thiruvengadam Lane in Perambur. The road was resurfaced with concrete sometime in early 2016. Then, it was the turn of TANGEDCO to dig up the road in September 2017, to lay a new power cable to connect one transformer to another. Upon inquiring why the road was being dug up within a span of months, we were informed that a new electric cable needs to be laid and this work could be done only after the sanctions were in place. It’s been months and the dug up road…

In the latter half of November 2017, as bulldozers razed some unauthorised religious structures that stood tall on Chitlapakkam Lake for years, hordes of curious onlookers gathered on the streets, pausing their daily chores. Led by senior IAS officer P Amudha, the Public Works Department demolished a few temples, a mosque and a church that residents have been emotionally and spiritually connected to, for decades. What warmed the officials’ hearts were the smiles on the faces of the people, many of whom lauded the speedy action. But, can we expect similar action in all the water bodies of Chennai? Religious…

Smart Cities Mission (SCM), an exclusive initiative of the Modi government, has got much attention because of its promise to dramatically transform cities. SCM was launched in 2015, aiming to develop 100 cities in the country as ‘smart cities’. The cities are selected based on their current development status and their project proposals. The chosen cities get funding of Rs 500 cr each from the central government and the respective state governments. They have to secure the rest of the funds through municipal bonds, PPP projects etc. This implies that citizens will have to pay user charges for many of…

If you were to ask any commuter in any Indian city about their daily pet peeve, it would be the time spent in traffic. And now, Ola, the new age mobility platform serving 110 cities with 8 lakh vehicles on the roads has presented a year-end glimpse of 'how India commuted' based on their records. Some highlights from the top seven cities - Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Pune, Kolkata, and Chennai: Total average traffic speed dropped by a whopping 2.9km/hr with Bangalore registering the slowest at 17.2km/hour Ola Share has saved 4 times the fuel from last year, telling of the high customer adoption…

Once again it’s that time of the year when we are most prone to looking back and ahead at the same time. Taking stock of the year’s discourse on urbanisation in India, it is evident that some issues have consistently dominated the narrative and been on top of the minds of urban citizens in 2017. These are also issues that we need to sustain focus upon as we move into the new year, since they will continue to play an important role in determining the dynamics and direction of development in the country, and in particular in its cities. As…

Sitting in a corner of her rented room in Korrukupet, C Shanthi, a manual scavenger is restless. Shanthi is not certain how much longer she will have this house in Anandanayaki Nagar as her shelter. The 40-year-old woman has not paid her rent over the past two months. A widow, Shanthi has been working at the Chennai Central railway station for the past five years. Her job includes sweeping and often cleaning faeces off the platforms, thus saving passengers the ordeal of foul sights and stench. What she gets in return for taking up this unsavoury profession is appalling: irregular…

On December 22nd, a woman was forced to deliver her child at the Mangalore Railway Junction (MAJN), after an ambulance failed to reach the remote area due to the narrow roads leading up to it. The 26-year-old woman, identified as Lata, a migrant labourer from Madhya Pradesh, was waiting for the train at the station, when she started experiencing labour pain and repeatedly cried out for help. Abubakker, a local rickshaw driver, immediately called 108 emergency services and directed them to the location. However, though the nearest ambulance reached the spot, the vehicle could not drive up to the station…