GENRE: In Focus

The recent formation of a new Maharashtra government and the appointment of a new chief minister has quickly led to abrupt policy changes for Mumbaikars. On June 29th, ex-chief minister Uddhav Thackeray resigned from his post, and on the next day, Eknath Shinde was sworn in as the new CM of Maharashtra. The new government, a coalition of BJP and rebel Shiv Sena MLAs, is set to bring in policy changes, especially in the face of the forthcoming Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) elections.  The result of a widely publicised and unpredictable political conflict was sudden changes in government decisions, particularly the controversial reversal of Uddhav…

"In my class, if a girl got her periods, two other girls stood behind her as human shields, so that nobody would see her holding a sanitary pad in class. If someone saw her with a pad, she feared being judged,” recalls 19-year-old Keerthana Srinivasan. This attitude is all too common among young people shielded from learning about themselves and their bodies. "Pads are not missiles to be afraid of!," says Sharath Sathya, founder of Karpom Karpipom, an NGO working towards sex education in schools. Keerthana finished Class 12 in 2020 from a school in Chrompet sans any kind of…

There have been various developments around public transport systems in the city over the past year.  The work on Chennai Metro Phase 2 has been underway for a few months, with stations and lines coming up across the city. The proposal to merge the MRTS with CMRL has also moved forward with assent from the government.  The Metro’s rapid development has meant various traffic roadblocks in the city as the necessary infrastructure is being put in place. There have also been issues with the CMRL taking over green spaces such as Thiru Vi Ka Park and Panagal Park.  In addition…

This is the first of a two part series on why health insurance companies refuse to reimburse treatment cost of mental illness, despite laws and insurance regulator guidelines saying they must treat mental illness on par with any other physical illness. "I bought a health insurance policy from a well-known insurance agency in 2014,” says V Naresh, 73, (name changed on request). “In January 2020, my 39-year-old son, who was diagnosed with a psychiatric illness, was admitted to rehab for 25 days. In March 2020, I put in a claim of around Rs. 2.75 lakh for the treatment, but it…

For over a decade now, residents of Indira Nagar slums in Mumbai's Sewree have been waiting for a road that would not be an invitation to diseases in their homes. But that has not happened yet. With the arrival of the monsoon, the road adjoining their makeshift houses gets waterlogged making their living conditions difficult and threatening public health.  "The water and mud accumulate when it rains heavily, even taxis don't come here. People here frequently fall sick in the rains. There have been so many people who have had dengue or malaria in the past," said 42-year-old Laxmi Harijan,…

Before Chennai became the bustling metropolis that it is today, bright, artifical light was limited to a few sources. Street lights, name boards of shops and festive lighting were not as widespread. One could actually see stars in the night sky, an act almost impossible these days. Light pollution has not captured the attention of the masses but continues to grow as an issue that could affect human, animal and plant life in cities. We look at what light pollution means and some of the causes and effects of it across Chennai. Light pollution and its components Light pollution refers…

A lot has been happening with the Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) of Chennai over the past year. The transport body has embraced technology for live tracking. The process of fleet expansion is also underway, along with the procurement of more e-buses. The 'free travel for women' scheme has been well-received and earned plaudits, in addition to increasing ridership among women. We present a round-up here of all such recent developments related to the city's most important mode of public commute, its bus service. Dedicated app and GPS tracking The much-awaited mobile application to track the movement of MTC buses in…

Year after year, images of people wading their way through knee-deep water, potholes, and building collapses are splashed across newspapers and TV screens as soon as monsoons begin in Mumbai. Mumbaikars endure unsafe commutes without many choices. They register complaints on various platforms, and while Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) authorities claim to take note of their grievances, little materialises. A new report analysing councillors' performance confirms this. BMC's Councillors "do not appear to be interested in permanently solving day-to-day civic problems", states the report, released to the public earlier in July ahead of the civic body elections. "Instead, they show…

If you have felt like Chennai's streets are turning increasingly cacophonous lately, the belief may not be unfounded. The city has been ranked the noisiest city among seven metros - Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Lucknow, Delhi, and Kolkata by the pollution watchdog, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) of India in their Annual Report 2020-21. Despite this, there is little attention paid to the problem of noise pollution in Chennai. "Noise pollution does not get the same attention as air pollution or water pollution," said Prabhakaran Veerarasu, an environmental engineer with the environmental collective Poovulagin Nanbargal. "This is because the impact…

On June 30th, the Shiv Sena rebel leader Eknath Shinde became the 20th Chief Minister of Maharashtra, and Bharatiya Janata Party's Devendra Fadnavis returned to power as his deputy. In their first cabinet meeting, held hours after the oath-taking ceremony, the first decision they took was to shift the construction of the metro car shed for the 33.5 km underground Colaba-Bandra-SEEPZ Metro Project (Line 3) from Kanjurmarg back to the Aarey Milk Colony in Goregaon. Effectively affecting the Aarey forest as a whole. Backlash followed as environmentalists took to the streets in protest after two-odd years. Commonly known as 'Aarey…