GENRE: Voices

BMTC Bangalore runs two types of ordinary services - the black board routes covering upto 15 kms (numbered 1 to 209) from city centre and the red board routes covering areas longer than 15 kms from city centre (numbered above 210). The bus passes cost more for red board buses than those for the black board buses. But in reality - the red board buses are at times cheaper and faster than their black board counterparts. Despite the longer distance, they have lesser stages. However boarding a red board bus might mean walking a few more yards to the appropriate…

On September 7th 2010,  the Bangalore Mirror reported BDA Commissioner Bharat Lal Meena as saying that gated communities are illegal. Meena was reported saying every layout is required to earmark space for parks, roads and areas of common use. "When roads and parks inside the community are controlled by civic authorities, how can such layouts be called gated communities?" Meena is reported to have asked. Ashok Haranahalli, Advocate General of Karnataka Pic: Vaishnavi Vittal. In May 2008, the BBMP issued a public notice with regard to barricading layouts and preventing use by general public. The notice says that there is…

The short film has been a part of the young Bangalorean's vocabulary for some time now. But last weekend the entire movement received a fillip when Suchitra's Centre for Film & Drama (CFD) brought together 50 short films made by 29 filmmakers from six states across India under the Short Film Festival. Even if the cinema was not always cutting edge, there was an abundance of ideas, creative experiments and youthful vibrancy. You could not but help notice the buzzing energy in the air as these filmmakers, many of them just out of college, shared their work in a ‘housefull'…

For 41 years now, Bangalore Kidney Foundation has been working for the cause of people with kidney problems, those whose kidneys are failing them and those who need dialysis, and sometimes kidney transplants. Having been a regular visitor to their annual fundraising event, 'Dhwani', and having contributed to the funds, I found myself curious about the origins and reach of the Bangalore Kidney Foundation (BKF), and decided to meet P Srinivas, one of the founder-trustees of the Foundation, at his home in Jayanagar. This septuagenarian's family owns Rapsri Engineering Industries Ltd. P Srinivas, Founder-Trustee of Bangalore Kidney Foundation. Pic: Deepa…

A swanky, new, maroon coloured car drove down from Madhavan Park towards the Jayanagar shopping complex in south Bangalore one recent morning, as I was walking along that stretch. This car had a set of large, cute-looking, black-and-white puppies painted on its side. A man who was driving past in another car, pointed to the  puppies painted on the maroon car and  exclaimed to his wife sitting beside him, as I stood waiting to cross the road,  "Look at that -" and while he was pointing he failed to notice the cyclist who was riding past on his right, and…

Travel in air-conditioned (AC) buses in Bangalore reminds me of the early days of plane travel where the atmosphere was quite rarefied. People usually dressed for the occasion, prim and proper. The chatter of railway journeys was absent (even now it is the same). As for the AC buses in Bangalore, it is not that people boarding these buses dress up for the occasion but it is just that normally they are better-dressed than the ones traveling in ordinary buses. The only sound you hear in AC buses is either that of the AC or the conductor! The AC buses…

Has BBMP learnt a lesson or two from the Sampige Road-Malleswaram mess?  Why on earth does the BBMP keep sanctioning multi-storeyed apartment complexes flouting building Bye-laws/CDP norms?  We have a crowded narrow road of 9.5m wide in Ward No. 179 (Shakambarinagar) in JP Nagar Ist Phase.  The road has quite a few bottlenecks and the Traffic Police have barred entry of heavy traffic vehicles from 46th cross Jayanagar (Inner Ring Road) and from Indira Gandhi Circle on the other end.  Recently BBMP has sanctioned 250 high-end apartment buildings on an 8 acre land adjoining this narrow road.  The Comprehensive Development…

For over two hours on Saturday August 14, beginning at 9.30 am, I carried out this experiment, around the intersection near Jayanagar’s fourth block bus terminus. In that duration, out of 48 car drivers and passengers who stopped along the kerb and opened the car door on the right, 35 did not bother to watch out for oncoming traffic. That’s around 80 per cent. File pic: Raghavendra G. Remember the accident reported in the papers a few days ago, where a car driver opening his vehicle’s door caused the death of a two wheeler rider who rammed into the open…

Roadwidening. Who thought that such a term would come into being and cause such a brouhaha here in Bengaluru. Anyways - the protests, the government and BBMP going back and forth on suspending roadwidening, TDR (Transfer of Development Rights) notices being slapped, red marks on the wall - all this has been talked about over and over. Now here's something new to swallow. Sources in the BBMP recently told Citizen Matters about 23 roads that are being widened. This is not part of the list of roads that are stuck in a High Court case. These are roads of newly-added…

I was lucky to avoid myself and family getting mugged on Monday late night near Devanahalli. It was around 1:15 am last Tuesday. I was on my way to my in-laws place, after picking up my cousin from the Bangalore International Airport. I took a turn from National Highway-7 towards Devanahalli. I wasn't sure of the exact turn towards H-Cross (This is the junction where four roads – Devanahalli, Bangalore, Kolar, Chintamani – meet. It is around 22 kms from Devanahalli). So I stopped near a Tata Indica and asked my wife Sandhya to lower her window to ask the…