Civic

Common Purpose, sponsored by Comic Relief, is running an online crowd sourcing challenge to explore how we can increase civic engagement in Bengaluru. The Common Purpose Challenge, which is also running in Manchester, United Kingdom is asking residents of both cities to work together to generate new ideas that will increase civic engagement. The winning ideas will be presented to a distinguished panel led by Academy Award winner David Puttnam, and including Director General of Police, Karnataka, MN Reddi and Trustee of Bangalore Little Theatre, Vijay Padaki. The challenge is hosted online through Crowdicity, an innovative crowd sourcing platform. Residents…

B.PAC is working with Hasiru Mithra (the HSR Layout residents’ initiative) and Syngene on a neighbourhood cleanup drive. This will be a sustained campaign to drive corporate social engagement that brings corporates, neighborhood communities and BBMP together to clean, drive behavioural change and monitor progress. Employees and residents of the neigbourhood work together to beautify their locality and appoint wardens who will keep watch on the neighbourhood to ensure that the cleaned up areas do not relapse into their original state. Cleanup drive on January 30th The 27th main road in HSR Layout is one of the prime roads in the…

A foggy start to the morning. Pic: Kere Habba* On January 9th 2016, Kaikondrahalli Lake played host to a bunch of events for the second time with more than 4,500 people from neighbourhood participating. Kere Habba 2016 aimed at raising awareness, increasing community participation and fostering an appreciation of lakes in Bangalore. Birders looking to spot as many species. Pic: Kere Habba* Dechamma Chetan, a visitor said, "The lake is a beautiful place for bird watching", and that she had a great time. Another visitor, Chirdeep Shetty, he said too loved the event. Mukesh, who lives near the lake, came…

The Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL), a public sector major, via its wholly owned subsidiary, GAIL Gas, has secured BBMP permission to lay liquified natural gas (LNG) 'last mile' pipelines for retail consumers in some parts of Bengaluru including HSR Layout (other areas being Jalahalli, etc).   The HSR pipeline network is one of the tail ends of the 1386 kilometer long Dabhol-Bangalore LNG pipeline, work on which was inaugurated by the former prime minister Manmohan Singh in December 2013 and was commissioned in February 2015. Digging trenches for the first part of the work has commenced in the…

The Karnataka Municipal Act 1976, amended as per the requirements of the famous 74th Constitutional Amendment in 1994, stipulates that there “…be a ward committee for each ward … (that) shall consist of … the Councillor representing the ward … (and) ten other members … (including) members of resident’s associations...” The KMC Act further stipulates that the “ward committee... prepare ward development schemes, … , ensure proper utilization of funds, ..., supervise all programmes and schemes being implemented by the corporation … .” If all went as per the Act’s designs, the ward committee would “ensure timely collection of taxes,…

Several months ago I wrote about my attempts to get a streetlight fixed on the `model street' of 15th Cross Malleshwaram. First some `jugaad' work had been done by BBMP. When I complained - nothing happened. Then providence intervened in the form of a truck backing up and breaking the light - resulting in the light - still functional - leaning precariously against a fence, possibly electrifying it. An urgent complaint to the MLA's office as well as BBMP got the job done - they removed the streetlight - and with it, the jugaad job. Picture on August 26th 2015…

United Technologies Corporation on December 19th today announced the 12 winners of India’s first ever Neighbourhood Improvement Partnership Challenge (NIP), an initiative of UTC’s Citizens for the City Program. The winning projects and support teams will collectively receive a total amount of nearly Rs one crore. The 12 winners will implement projects in the areas of mobility, waste management, public safety, autonomous building, water quality and rejuvenation of public spaces. Chris Rao, VP and Country Head, UTC Aerospace Systems and Goldie Srivastava, Director - Communication, United Technologies India along with the 12 winning teams who will collectively receive a total…

Khata is the record maintained in the Corporation office on the ownership right of a property owner in the BBMP area. Obtaining this after a person has acquired the title to a property has become a nightmare in Bengaluru, with endless delays, pervasive corruption and official apathy. Every person who has acquired a title to property in Bengaluru by any means, usually by purchase, but also by inheritance, gift or any other method, is harassed by BBMP officials, their middlemen and agents when (s)he tries to get the khata. This document is required for all transactions relating to loan to…

Now an annual fest at namma Turahalli forest, Turahalli Day was celebrated on December 6th 2015. The day began by around 6.30 am with people gathering under the banyan tree. Ganeshram and Anurag, who were there to go on a plant walk, were already in a ‘taxonomic’ discussion with Ravee. A few others joined them and off they went on a green path. Here's the highlight of the plant walk, in Ganeshram's words: "One of the topics that was underlying the whole walk was the importance of forests and native flora and how it affects us. The other was how knowledge…

As the rains continue to batter the city, it is easy to see that the infrastructure is of very poor quality. The potholes, the overflowing sewage, the flooding... these and many other observable things in the city remind us how shabby the quality of public works is. But this is only the apparent problem, the actual problem is deeper. Let's ask ourselves : why are the roads so bad? And then follow the answers steadily deeper to the root of the problem. The roads are bad because there is no check on their quality during the construction phase, and no…