GENRE: Voices

This is the tale of a father who feels bad that his daughter has to suffer due to the greed of private schools. Let me share how I got involved with the school fee issue; and how it impacts us parents. My daughter is in the third standard. We were extremely shocked to realise that access to her online classes was blocked by her school on August 5, 2020. She has studied in this school right from Nursery. We soon learnt that many private schools have blocked online education to some kids. Almost all parents have been paying whatever schools…

On the one hand, it is good news. The Chennai Metro Water Supply and Sewerage Board (CMWSSB) is looking at creating a museum at the Kilpauk Water Works. The Police Commissioner’s Office in the city is setting up a museum at its old office in Egmore. The Corporation is debating the possibility of a city museum in Victoria Public Hall. Three great institutions of the city almost simultaneously working on museums for themselves! What more could we ask for? The question is how sustainable will these be in the long run given that they will almost certainly be run by…

In 2019, the Indore Municipal Corporation became the first Indian city to clear around 15 lakh tonnes of historic waste at landfills using a process called bioremediation. With overflowing landfills and the difficulty of finding new waste disposal sites, Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) across the country now look at the Indore project as an example worth emulating to clear out waste dumps at landfills. Cities like Bijapur, Davanagere, Doddaballapur, and most recently, Hassan and Gokak have already invited Expressions of Interest or tenders for conducting bioremediation. While this may result in reclaiming some land from waste disposal sites, several challenges…

Translated by Sandhya Raju முப்பத்தியோரு வயது பொறியாளர் எம் பி அழகு பாண்டிய ராஜா, ஜனவரி 25-ம் தேதி அன்று இந்தியாவின் முதல் நகர பதுமுறைகாணல் அதிகாரியாக (City Innovation Officer) நியமிக்கப்பட்டார். இங்கிலாந்தில் மென்பொருள் நிறுவனத்தில் ஐந்து ஆண்டுகள் வேலை பார்த்த அழகு பாண்டிய ராஜா, தாய் நாட்டிற்கு பங்களிக்க வேண்டும் என்ற உந்துதலால், சென்னை திரும்பினார். இந்தியன் ஸ்மார்ட் சிட்டி ஃபெலோ (Indian Smart City Fellow) பணியில் தன்னை இணைத்துக் கொண்ட அவர், சென்னை மாநகராட்சியுடன் இணைந்து ஆகியவற்றிற்கு புது தீர்வுகளை கொண்டு வந்தார். சென்னை மாநகராட்சி ஆணையர் ஜி பிரகாஷ் மற்றும் வருவாய் துணை ஆணையர் மேகநாத் ரெட்டி ஆகியோரின் முயற்சியே புதுமுறைகாணலுக்கான ஒரு பிரிவினை உருவாக்க காரணம் என்கிறார். இந்த புதிய பதவியில் அவரது பங்கு குறித்தும், பதுமுறைகாணல் அதிகாரியாக பொது மக்களுடனான ஈடுபாடு குறித்தும் அவரிடம் சிட்டிசன் மேட்டர்ஸ் உரையாடியது. சென்னையின்…

According to some accounts such as this, every year over 200 pedestrians are killed on Hyderabad’s roads on average. This number might seem like a lot, but as someone who walks very often, I was actually expecting it to be quite higher considering the absolute lack of apathy from our civic authorities and even fellow citizens to pedestrian safety.  It is said that everyone is a pedestrian at some point. I don’t know how true that is, because it fails to explain the life-threatening situations our city forces pedestrians to be in almost everywhere. Issues with infrastructure A big part…

On January 25th, Chennai appointed the country’s first Innovation Officer. 31-year-old engineer M P Azhagu Pandia Raja is all set to assume the role. Azhagu Pandia Raja spent five years with a software firm in the UK, before his urge to contribute to the nation brought him back to the country. He has since had a successful stint as an Indian Smart City Fellow, during which time he pioneered solutions around waste management and COVID response, working closely with the Chennai Corporation.  He credits the efforts of G Prakash, Commissioner, Greater Chennai Corporation and Meghanath Reddy, Deputy Commissioner, Revenue in…

There was a time when you could build a long. successful career by focusing on one narrow domain in which you were an expert. For example, you could start in accounts, move up to finance, then to the board and may be the MD’s suite. That changed some decades back when managements began to realise that an ‘I’-shaped knowledge base was not enough in a changing world. Companies started rotating people from finance to manufacturing to marketing before considering a person suitable for the corner office or the ‘C’ suite. In line with this, business schools created the ‘T’ shaped learning…

Elections, our festival of democracy, are around the corner in Tamil Nadu. A good indicator of election season of late has been the flurry of activity by the civic body across the city. Roads that citizens have complained about for years with no response get a facelift, potholes are fixed, pavements are laid and any and all grievance is addressed with a swiftness that makes one wish election season lasted longer.  Several infrastructure development projects which had been put on the back burner over the past five years will now be taken up on a war footing and completed in…

It cannot be denied that 2020 had much to occupy the powers that be and also the rest of us, in this our city of Madras that is Chennai. Given that matters concerning heritage receive scant attention even in normal years, it is no surprise that there has been even less in the one that has just ended. But if we let matters drift this way, we may soon end up having very little to show as far as our built heritage is concerned. Some upsides There have been some positive developments – the Chepauk Palace restoration is going on…

Owning a house is the dream of a lifetime for all of us. In a city, owning an independent home is impossible even for the upper-middle class. So, an apartment is the only choice available for 90% of urban citizens. The other less attractive alternative is living in the extreme outskirts of the city in an independent house and traveling for longer hours to reach office every day.  Despite the housing market crisis post-2012, apartment prices have not come down. The price of apartments has largely stagnated since 2012 and now there's an oversupply of inventories. As of 2017, there…