CITIZEN MATTERS
Bangalore’s own interactive newsmagazine Speak up, it’s your city!
Dear Reader,
Season’s greetings!
It’s going to be Deepavali this weekend. While the festival of lights brings in joy and celebration, it’s also the time when pollution peaks, and crackers only add to it. Is anything being done to create awareness among children on harmful effects of crackers? Ponder over this: Deepavali in the city: can it be safer and ecofriendly?
The Steel Flyover Debate
Weekends in Bengaluru these days are a witness to a citizen movement that the city never saw in recent days: a human chain to protest a steel flyover, a no-vote collection and more. What’s happening in Bengaluru? Why is the ‘Steel Flyover’ being opposed?
Human chain near Chalukya circle. Pic: Shree D N
Bengaluru has the most active citizenry any city can dream of. A flyover planned from Chalukya Circle to Hebbal at the heart of the city has united many citizens in the city in protest. Not following the due process has irked many, while the BDA helped fuel the controversy by refusing to share the data publicly. Read: How BDA botches up the steel flyover issue by hiding information
While a set of people are opposing the steel flyover project, Balaji Ganesan, a techie and a volunteer for civic initiatives, argues why the flyover will help take away fast-moving traffic that goes towards Hebbal and ORR. Read: Is Bengaluru’s civil society scoring self goals?
What documents are online?
We compiled the documents the BDA released, on Eprocurement website and on its own website.
Citizens of Bellandur get together to find a way to remove the huge advertisement displays. Meera Nair describes the drive and the learning. Read: Getting illegal ad display boards out of sight.
Welfare schemes and urban poor
The United Nations observes October 17th as the International Day for Eradication of Poverty. But for the BPL families in Bengaluru, the welfare schemes of the government continue to be far from reach. Read:So many social welfare schemes, who benefits?
Begging scam on the rise
Some strangers on the street approach you and say they have been cheated and ask you for money to go home. But you should never give money. Why? Because a begging scam is rampant on the streets of Bengaluru city, writes citizen journalist Shweta Taneja.
Citizens for the City
From a dark and dreary underbridge area to a bright and lively public space, here is the story of transformation of the railway underbridge near Shivananda Circle. Read: This railway underbridge has a story to tell.
On October 17th, Whitefield Rising launched a car-pool platform in partnership with PoolCircle o enable shared commute. Read more about it here.
Finding hidden birds
Walks are a great way to explore the hidden treasures in the city, including birds. Deepa Mohan narrates the story of one such walks in Lalbagh. Read her blogpost: Finding the hidden birds in urban green spaces.
Citizen diaries
Our writer Deepa Mohan figures out that the figures in the bill are misaligned and one can not really get proper information about their monthly bill in the piece of paper given by Bescom. Read: BESCOM’s instructions and why they are tough to follow.
Freelancer Deepa Mohan lost her driving licence. She shares her experience of the hurdles that she faced in the process of getting a duplicate licence, in this blog post.
Also read this photo featureby writer Deepa Mohan of spotting Yakshagana artists on the airport road.
How does a young Bengalurean perceive the ongoing US presidential election campaign? In a lighter whine, blogger Ritvik Mandyam makes a commentary on Donald Trump.
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In this edition, get an insight into how AA and Al-Anon help alcoholics and their families cope with alcoholism. Also read how bike ambulances are faring in Bengaluru, the reason why you may get curdled milk from the Karnataka Milk Federation, and what you can do to make the upcoming Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations eco-friendly, and more.
No more gas cylinders? Read about GAIL’s plans to get piped gas to your kitchen. Do check out two important campaigns that you can easily get involved in – Green Spot Challenge and My City My Budget. We also have the first article in our series on Disappearing Professions. All this and more.
Why is the BBMP unable to remove illegal hoardings? What are parents doing to protest against increasing school fees? What happens when buildings come up on lake wetlands? How can you quit smoking? All this and more in this week’s edition of Bengaluru This Week.
