GENRE: Voices

I want to thank the movement Citizens for Bengaluru (CfB) for pushing me to attend the ward committee meeting in my ward Shanthinagar. I’m glad I went. Kudos to all energetic young people, I now feel there’s hope for Bengaluru! On time, but low on public participation The meeting started on time, which was great. But citizen participation was very low, with only about 15 attending. Hardly anyone from RWAs was present. I thought RWAs exist to push citizens’ agenda, so I was not sure what to make of this. Of the 10 ward committee members, nine attended the meeting.…

The saga of transferring my late father-in-law’s car registration/title to my mother-in-law began on August 2, 2018. We had put together all the necessary documents after reviewing Wikiprocedure.com (not the RTO website) and speaking to other people who had gone through this process. The required documents included: The original RC book Form 31 Death certificate. Legal heir certificate issued by the Tahsildar’s office. Affidavits from the other legal heirs (my husband and his sister) that they had relinquished their rights in favour of the applicant (their mother) - these affidavits were on printed on stamp paper and notarized A copy…

Helen was a dog who produced many Labrador pups—a puppy mill mom — who was finally abandoned by her breeders on the streets when she couldn’t do it anymore. Blind, deaf, malnutritioned, she was rescued and adopted by animal rights activist Bismi Anil. Helen stood as a testimony to all that’s wrong with the implementation of animal cruelty laws in Karnataka and in fact most of India.   Dogs are repeatedly bred using rape stands, in the filthiest, tiniest of spaces, often with a sibling or parent and live in small cages with little or no food, medical facilities, human…

The steel flyover project is an ugly manifestation of our unbridled urbanisation mindset. This is yet another myopic economic proposal to exacerbate urbanisation; it seems to us, and is mindlessly espousing the following: Covering the soil which has lower heat conductivity, with an impermeable layer of concrete which has much higher capacity to conduct heat. Replacing life sustaining trees with air conditioners Spewing billions of tons of toxic gases into air by vehicular movements and industrial activities, so as to choke the city. Generating colossal quantities of solid waste to convert the garden city into a garbage city Facilitating concentration…

The Supreme Court has put a stay on the pumping of treated wastewater to Kolar tanks from the wastewater treatment plants in the Koramangala and Chalaghatta valley of Bengaluru, comes the news. The stay means that this volume of treated wastewater will flow in the Dakshina Pinakini, mix with volumes of untreated wastewater and reach Kelavarapalle dam near Hosur in Tamil Nadu. These waters will then be used to irrigate 1085 acres of land to be cultivated by Tamil Nadu farmers. Some amount of the water will also be picked up by farmers in Karnataka through pumps for irrigation. A…

Following the complete digitization of the cable TV network, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), the regulatory body for broadcasting notified a regulatory framework for broadcasting and cable TV services in March 2017. The framework is applicable to services provided through Direct to Home (DTH) Systems, Cable TV Systems provided through Digital Addressable Systems (DAS), Head-end in the Sky (HITS) and Internet Protocol TV (IPTV). These regulations are aimed at addressing various issues related to the sector. This regulatory framework included the following. Uniform Tariff for DTH & Cable TV Services: The Telecommunication (Broadcasting and Cable) Services (Eighth) (Addressable Systems) Tariff Order.…

Air pollution has been a cause of worry globally. Economic growth of cities has influenced the spatial patterns of emission sources, directly impacting public health. Bengaluru’s rapid development and changing landscape followed by lack of planning has led to several urban concerns, with air pollution being a crucial one. Contributors to air pollution are unique to each city. Vehicular pollution is among those concerns that contributes maximum to air pollution in Bengaluru. Data indicates that 60-70% of the emissions is said to originate from vehicles. This makes the city the only one in India to be most impacted by vehicular…

Sabarimala is on national news now. The age-old tradition of denying women below the age of fifty entry into the famous temple has been broken. Two women have bravely gone where no woman (in that age group) has gone since 1991. Protests have erupted across the state of Kerala, but they seem to be largely politically motivated. So then, which side does the average person take in this seemingly dicey debate? For starters, you might think, like many others, ‘Why did these women choose to target this long-held religious custom? Why not address issues in other social and work related settings?’…

With the Tamil Nadu government's partial ban on single-use plastic in place since January 1st, Citizen Matters spoke to Rajendra Ratnoo, IAS, one of the the three regional coordinators working to make the transition to a plastic-less state smooth and ensure the success of the ban. We asked him some of the questions raised most often by our readers. What happens to the existing single use plastic in possession with the people as on January 1st? The segregated collection of waste by the local body is already underway in many places. People can turn in the single use plastic they…

The new year 2019 promises to be a landmark year for Mahadevpura Parisara Samrakshane Mattu Abhivrudhi Samiti (MAPSAS) in lake rejuvenation and sustenance. The efforts to rejuvenate Kaikondrahalli Lake and Lower Ambalipura - the first lakes MAPSAS got involved with - started a decade ago in 2009. From a motley group of citizens who came together to envision a participatory and progressive way of managing our water resources in the form of lakes, some of us made a Trust called MAPSAS (Mahadevpura Parisara Samrakshane Mattu Abhivrudhi Samiti). We have taken more and more lakes in the neighborhood under our ambit.…