Z-Blogs

On the occasion of Republic Day, flag hoisting was held in the premises at Kuvempu Nagar Residents Welfare Association (KRWA)on the morning of January 26th. The Chief Guest was S Nagaraj, BTM resident and former secretary of KRWA. He retired as Assistant Director, National Aeronautics Laboratory (NAL) after more than 40 years of service. Founder President Satyaraj, current president Padmakshi presided over the function. Sweets were distributed to all present for the occasion.⊕

The old saying that "A family that eats together stays together" certainly holds good even today, but just needs to be tweaked a little to suit today's health conscious world. It should now read "A family that eats healthy and exercises together stays fit together!" As a dietitian my goal is not only to get my client on the right 'eating' path, but also to extend the benefits of healthy eating and regular exercise to his/her family. Many a time, clients (mostly women) give up on a regimen as it proves difficult to make two different menus - a regular…

Last week,a mammoth conference of psychiatrists was organized at Bangalore. The Annual Conference of the Indian Psychiatric Society, We had more than four thousand psychiatrists attendingIt was declared as a green conference and in place of the usual mementos for speakers, six hundred saplings were planted, at Turahalli Reserve Forest.The forest department organized a memorable function on the day before the event. The Indian Psychiatric Society is the first professional organization to take this initiative and I hope more will follow! Additonally, all the conference halls were named after birds!Kudos to Dr R Raguram, who is theProfessor & Head of…

One of the unusual features of this year's Bird Race was the fact that seven teams out of 35 (that's one fifth!) wanted to go together, rathen than compete on their own. One team, Flamingo, had to drop out, and the other, Flowerpecker, started late..and went on to win the race. But here are teams...Black StorkFalconIbisRuffandSpotted Owletall together in the morning...We stayed together throughout the day, made sure as many of us as possible could see each bird.... had chai, breakfast, and lunch, enjoyed ourselves very much...and one of the teams still managed to get the third prize, and that's…

I've been interacting, on FaceBook, with the MD of BESCOM (Bangalore Electricity Supply Corporation), Mr Manivannan (though our interaction is not mainly on civic issues..he's quite a poet!). I have been getting the sense that he's shaking up this behemoth and making them more accountable and user-friendly.I realized that if I was going to be away for a long time, I could ask for minimum billing on my apartment. I wrote to the contact email (Ms Jayanathi) on the BESCOM website...and promptly got a return email from her, telling me whom I had to contact, and the phone nos...and additional…

On Friday, 11th Jan 2013, a few of us were going for a birding trail, and we were waiting at the chai shop at Mantri Residency Apartments, on Bannerghatta Road, for a couple of others to arrive.Suddenly, in the pre-dawn dark, my friends (all young men) said there had been an accident, and rushed on about 10 yards ahead. Then one of them came back and told me that it was a girl who had been hit. A Tata Sumo driver had started the car and speeded up, and a young woman (about 19 or 20, I'd guess) had suddenly…

The Indian Institute of Public Administration is holding a seminar on the reconstitution of the municipal area into two or more cities. If implemented, that would end the experiment of consolidating all the cities in the area into one single BBMP. I'm speaking at the event later this morning ... here's the gist of what I plan to say.In December 2005, when the government pushed through the creation of BBMP, Subbu Vincent and I wrote an editorial, titled "The sum of broken parts" arguing that this was a bad move. I predicted then that we would be forced to abandon…

As part of the Solid Waste Management PIL, the High Court asked BBMP to setup the ward committees to help monitor SWM contracts etc.The question of ward committees came up in the case when talking about decentralisation and audits on waste management, says Ajesh Kumar Shankar, lawyer for the petitioner. “Currently no one knows about who clears the waste in a street in a ward, how much is billed for it, who gets paid etc. There is a requirement that an NGO or RWA in the area should sign the bill; contractors get away by ‘creating’ some groups who sign…

Some of the BULBs (Bangalore Urban Lady Birders) decided to meet up for lunch at Halli Mane on Sankranti Day:The decorations were beautiful...made of palm fibre:made of palm fronds: This is the menu, as displayed on the board:kharabUjatha rasa (Musk Melon juice)eLLu--bellA-kabbu (Sesame seeds-jagger-sugar cane)hesaru beLe pAyasA( Mung dal payasa)mAvina midi uppinkAyA (Maavadu, small mango pickle)chOLada kOsambari (Salad with corn and grated carrots)moLagekkALu, dAdimba kOsambari (Salad with sprouted green gram and pomegranate)Alu gaddE palyA (potato curry)dondekkAi, gOdambi palya (...... curry)mAvina kAyi chutney (mango chutney, not sweet)sihi pongal (sweet pongal)khArA pongal (savoury pongal)avarekkALu usli (preparation with winter beans)avarekkAlu bAth (rice with avarekkAlu…

The ruckus over the formation of ward committees is exposing the failures of city governance in a big way, and pointing to its main cause - the exclusion of citizens from decision-making. But that's not all. It is also exposing the hollowness of the legislative space, which also needs to be urgently fixed.I am told that the Bommanahalli MLA opposes the formation of ward committees. I don't want to pick on one person, but let's look at the facts objectively. No BJP MLA should ever say that they're against ward committees. Why? Because they were the ones who voted for…