GENRE: Voices

With the Metrorail’s first phase now fully operational across the city, the organisation in charge, Chennai Metrorail Limited (CMRL), has begun planning for the second phase. Spanning over 119 km across three corridors, this project is expected to go for tendering by June this year. Soil testing is now ongoing in various parts of the city. The enthusiasm for the project is palpable, what with the first phase having shown how it can benefit the public. This is also time to ponder over how this phase can be handled in a more efficient manner than the first. The initial phase…

Did you know that apartments are at higher risk of fire hazard than factories producing combustible materials like firecrackers? Twenty nine percent higher risk, to be precise. And most of us live in apartment complexes. The fire tragedy at Carlton Towers nine years ago, brought to the forefront the perils of fire in high rise buildings dotting the Bengaluru skyline. To mark the ninth anniversary, Beyond Carlton, a group of citizens working towards fire safety in Bangalore, has partnered with the Bangalore Apartments Federation (BAF) to do a fire risk assessment of registered apartments in the city absolutely free. Cheryl…

With the announcement of the schedule for the imminent Lok Sabha polls, the entire nation is gripped by election fever. However, apart from the dates and clarifications over electoral procedure, the Election Commission in its communique has also spelt out the provision of some online/mobile facilities for the voter. For effective conduct of elections, the ECI has integrated use of telecommunications and smart technology in various processes of elections. Here are a few helplines and apps that will be useful as you get ready to cast your vote in the mammoth democratic exercise coming up in a few weeks from…

What does a city look like? Who lives in the city? If you are thinking of the New York skyline, skyscrapers, wide roads, clean streets and cars, you are perhaps not alone. These westernized imaginings are quick to invade our mind whenever there is talk of urbanscape. However, now think consciously of the space that we inhabit, a typical Indian megacity, and our own daily experiences may present themselves as stark contradictions. Having lived in Mumbai, when I think of a city I am taken back to my daily commutes to college, in the local trains. Standing at the doorstep,…

"Celebrating four years of changemaking"- this is what my good friends at Namma Ooru Foundation (NOF) Called the event. So naturally I expected to hear stories of the journey, milestones, troubles encountered along, successes hard earned, etc. And of course I knew that I would be meeting many of Chennai's environment warriors. I was looking forward to it. It was all that, and more. I met several of the remarkable individuals that we keep reaching out to, both for our writings at Citizen Matters, and in our personal capacity, for guidance in our efforts to refuse, reduce, reuse and recycle.…

This January, BBMP  floated a new tender to deal with the city's perennial garbage problem. D Randeep, Special Commissioner (Solid Waste Management and Health), BBMP, sat down for a chat with 'Citizens Live' to answer niggling doubts about the controversial tender. "The central issue is still segregation. The new policy is that wet and sanitary waste will be picked up by BBMP everyday. Dry waste will be picked up by NGOs, waste collectors," he said. He stressed that it was therefore imperative that we, the general public, segregate our waste. "If you don't, we do have provisions to penalise people;…

In what seems to be a milestone in legislation towards addressing grievances of the Indian consumers, the Lok Sabha recently passed the Consumer Protection Bill (CPB), 2018. The bill, tabled first in 2015 and passed by the Lok Sabha on December 20, 2018 seeks to replace the three-decade-old Consumer Protection Act, 1986. The latter was amended thrice but failed to tackle challenges posed by online transactions and digital marketing. According to the Corporate Affairs Ministry, the objective of the Bill is ‘‘to provide for the protection of the interests of consumers and for the said purpose, to establish authorities for timely…

You see them every morning, all across the city. Pourakarmikas, pushing their rickety handcarts, sweeping the streets and collecting the garbage that residents, shops and others have just left by the roadside for them to clear. Bangalore actually needs many more of these unrecognised and overworked workers, who provide a truly essential service, keeping the city clean. But have you ever wondered what does their work mean to them? Is it a choice or a compulsion? Pourakarmikas toil in working conditions that are far from perfect, as numerous reports and studies have shown. Hired by contractors selected by the city…

After having lived in Delhi through the seventies for over a decade, every short trip I make to Delhi is one of a sense of loss. I do not recognize the Delhi that I grew up in anymore. With the exploding boundaries, the flyovers that dwarf the city, the mindboggling traffic and the crowds, and of course the smog, the pollution, I have stopped relating to the city that I loved so much. As I made a brief two-day visit to the city, I decided to recapture the magic, the stunning royal walk from India Gate to Rashtrapati Bhavan. Much…

I was pretty excited and went with a lot of hope to attend a 'Namma Karnataka' development conclave at Vidhana Soudha on February 17, jointly organised by a media house and Government of Karnataka. The event, however, turned out to be a major marketing and propaganda exercise of government’s infamous Elevated Road Corridor Project. Large flex banners highlighting the project had been put up at the venue, and the panel discussion on Bengaluru’s transport issues hardly had any discussion, and there was no question and answer session. Since I and many other invitees did not get an opportunity to voice…