High Court Contempt Notice to BMRC and BBMP

I read this in Times of India.

Contempt Plea:Notice to BMRC and BBMP Chiefs

Here lies the credibility of the our so called esteemed organizations like BMRC and BBMP that are supposed to develop India. I feel ashamed and so should every Indian.

I wonder why shouldnt one be punished for contempt. And particularly in these cases where the actions inviting these contempts are irreversible.

A tree cut in contempt cannot be brought back to life.
A pillar raised in contempt cannot come down.

I wonder about the strength of this contempt in the scheme of these things. I wonder as a simple, powerless India citizen.

Pondicherry Trip

Just came back from a weekend trip to Pondicherry. Will post everything here. It may be long. Hence it will come out in installments :-)



Journey to Pondicherry
We took the KSRTC (Karnataka Road Transport Corporation) bus from Bangalore. The bus takes around 6-7 hours to reach Pondicherry. We did the online reservation for the bus at http://ksrtc.in. Fortunately we got the reservation for the onward journey but did not get the reservation for the return. So the journey was kind of open ended. KSRTC bus volvo bus is kind of cluttered with less leg space. The bus left at around 2230 hours and reached Pondy at 5:30 in the morning. On the way the bus stopped at a coffee, restroom place where people could take whatever kind of break they need to. But most passengers prefer to continue sleeping. Right at 5:00 a.m, the bus driver started playing morning hymns at loud noise. And everyone jumped out of sleep. This was to alert the passengers that we are here at Pondy.

From Pondicherry bus stand to Place of stay
This was quite a drama. I am really waiting to see a place where the auto-rickshaw guys are calm, soft-spoken and charge the right amount. Well, you wont find them in Pondicherry. And if you are from bangalore, get ready to autos without meters. And in the absence of meters, get ready to be confused and shell out money. Soon after we landed, the auto guys surrounded us. When we said we want to go to Park Guest house, one of them said, ok it will Rs. 70. And we were clueless on what is the right amount. We said Rs. 50 and immediately one of them said ok fine. And there you go. We clearly made ourselves fools. It was hardly 3 kms to beach. It should not have been more than Rs. 25. Well we all learn. Park Guest House is on the beach and is run by Aurobindo Ashram it seems. We wanted to try a room there. Unfortunately they refused to do advanced reservation. And the reception office would not open before 7;00 a.m. So we decided to sit on the beach and watch the waves and wait for sun rise. The good thing was we could see the sun rise. We already had a booking done at French Villa but decided to try our luck. So when the Park Guest House office opened at 7:00 a.m, we went in and asked if there is room available. The person at reception said that we will have to wait till 10:00. Then we decided that there is no way we can wait for 3 more hours with bags on our back. So we went to French Villa.
And our dream to stay at Park Guest House on the beach remained unfulfilled.

Place of Stay in Pondicherry
There are several places to stay in Pondicherry. And all are pretty close to beach. All may not have beach view though. We stay at French Villa. But I would not recommend. Because it is very expensive and it does not deserve to be that expensive with the amenities it provides. The room rent was Rs. 1700 for a double bedded AC room. And I felt it should not be more than Rs. 500. Well, the only reason for its high price may be it location on a heritage walk street and proximity to beach. But so are other places. So it is worth checking prices of other places of stay. We couldnt since it was our first visit. May be in the next visit we will try some other place to stay. French Villa is 3 streets away from beach and neat street called Suffren Street. By the way, French Villa can give a 10% discount if you ask for it.

First Day Roming around
Sitting on the beach in the early morning and waiting for sun rise is a heavenly feeling. The roads are wide, clean and you can feel a fresh air. Thats how our stay at Pondicherry began. After freshening up at French Villa we decided to explore the city. But man, it is a hot city. At 8:00 a.m it was damn hot. Unimaginable. Good that we had our umbrella. Not to protect from rain but from sun. First, we went to Tourism office on Goubert Avenue. Gourbert Avenue is road adjoining the sea. The streets are so well planned that it is a fun walking on the streets of Pondicherry. From the tourism office, we got a map of the city and some information on landmark places. Then we decided to get some food since we were getting really hungry. The tourism office guy told us that there will be south india restaurant near Vinagar Kovil. So we decided to start our day by a visit to Shree Vinayagar kovil. Soon after the temple visit, as we came out, we saw Anand Adyar Bhavan right opposite the road. We enjoyed nice idli, dosa and coffee. But the restaurant was extremely crowded. And they take forever to serve your dish. But you cant help. Its a business at peak. It would be a great business to start another restraurant right there. :-) It was so hot outside that sitting inside the Anand Adyar Bhavan was bliss. After eating as we came out, we felt the furnace outside. Then we decided to go to Auroville and visit Matri Mandir. Auroville was around 10 km from Pondicherry beach area.

After waiting for bus and shared tempo services, we decided to take an auto. After a brief bargaining, we could get an auto for Rs. 110. But the journey to Auroville was like through a furnace. I almost felt roasted.

At Auroville
It took almost an hour to reach Auroville, while going through hot air. We asked for pass to visit Matri Mandir. Before getting a pass one has to watch a video. After watching the video we got the pass to visit Matri Mandir. But Matri Mandir can be viewed only from a distance of 200 meters. No one is allowed inside. One is allowed inside only to do meditation and one has to take permission couple of days in advance. After viewing from outside, we came back and had a simple meal at Auroville. There were exhibition shops etc. which were kind of expensive.



At Paradise Beach










From Auroville we went to paradise beach. The auto cost us around Rs. 220. They may charge higher but it could be bargained. At paradise beach, there were entry tickets and tickets as well if you want to use your camera. Once you are in, you have to purchase tickets for boats rides. Different kinds of boat rides are available. We took the "Beach Ride" that would take us via backwaters to the paradise beach where you see the sea. It was extremely hot there. After spending some time, we took a boat that would return back to where we boarded the boat.

Back to French Villa
The auto would charge around Rs. 150 but after bargaining it came at Rs. 120. It was time to take a small afternoon break from the hot sun.

Evening
After a short afternoon break, we spent the evening in walk around the beach. We sat for some time at Bharathi Park. In the evening it started drizzling. May be the rain gods got sympathetic to our condition of gettting roasted :-) In the night it rained heavily in Pondicherry. Since we were so tired by afternoon, we put the Aurobindo Ashram visit and museum visits to next morning.

Next Day
After a nice breakfast at Anand Adyar Bhavan, we first spent time at Aurobindo Ashram and then at Pondicherry Museum. It was a sunday. So, then we spent some time at market sicne sunday market is kind of special in Pondicherry. Then visited the Botanical Garden. But I was not impressed by Botanical garden. It did not seem to be maintained at all. Evening we spent time on the beach and visiting some handicrafts shops. The beach gets very crowded on sundays.

Pudumai
Pudumai is a beautiful and inexpensive handicrafts shop on the beach that is, on Goubert avenue. It is right next to Hotel Promenade. The stuff there seemed really reasonable. Other handicraft shops were closed since it was sunday. So that is another importan point. Surprisingly some shops in Pondicherry are closed on sundays. That is amusing to me.

Return to Bangalore
We were kind of tired and decided to find a bus directly to Bangalore rather that trying our original plan which was to come to Chennai via scenic East Coast Route and then try a bus from Chennai to Bangalore. There were no tickets available on KSRTC or PRTC (Pondicherry Road Transport Corporation). We tried some private travels as well. Finally we found 2 tickets on non-AC bus of S.R.S travels. It turned out that non-AC bus of S.R.S was much more spacious than the AC bus of KSRTC. I would not mind recommending S.R.S to people. But the only problem with these private travels is that you never where they will stop. But still the bus ride was fun enough. The S.R.S office is very close to the new bus stand of Pondicherry. The bus left at 10:30 p.m from S.R.S office and it reached Bangalore around 5:00 a.m.

Next time I visit Pondicherry, it will be not for tourism now but for Yoga or meditation.
Overall, a fun trip.

Key Points :

• Go with comfortable footwear. Otherwise your legs will hurt badly. Spongy and thick bathroom slippers are the best.
  
• Auto guys are notorious in the sense of overcharging. So keep bargaining.
  
• Most of the beautiful part of Pondicherry is walkable. The streets are beautiful and well planned so you know where exactly you are.
  
• Take sun screen with you.
  
• Take Odomos if you are going to sit on the Beach.
• There is a friday night train from Yeshwantpur to Pondicherry.
  
• There is a saturday night train from Pondicherry to Yeshwantpur.

Will add more if I remember anything.

Elections Verdict

Wrote it. Then got lazy. And then the delayed post.

What an election it was. I was glued to the TV sets for the whole weekend. All kinds of predictions were in the air.

At the end of the day, I was very happy. I was reassured. Happy that the people of this country unanimously voted for stability. Voted for securalism.

Can we say the electorate has matured? That is too far fetched. But whatever happened has has happened for good.

At least, the government now has a position where it cannot be blackmailed by every Tom Dick and Harry. And all those TDHs have been shown the real door.

And as I say, in a democracy one has to take a stand.

So people did take stand.

And hence went Vaiko out. People did not want an extremist who just does all kinds of talking. people had more important things to worry about at home.

And hence went TRS out. People must have thought that my children, my well being is much more important. And what KCR is doing is just his personal fight. Even he may not be sure if he wanted Telegana or not.

Out went Chiranjeevi. And with it went the caste based. And out went the caste based politics in Uttar Pradesh. And the SPs and BSPs with it.

Sooner the people of this country realize that caste, creed, religion have not gotten anyone anywhere, we will have better and better elections and the ones where we can be proud of each other.

Lok Raj Andolan

I saw the following from Arvind Kejriwal's blog on CNN IBN.

www.lokrajandolan.org

Fantastic Poem by Dushyant Kumar

This poem is in Hindi. Always inspires me. This is by the great poet named Dushyant Kumar.

हो गयी है पीर पर्वत सी पिघलनी चाहिए
इस हिमालय से कोई गंगा निकलनी चाहिए

आज यह दीवार परदों की तरह हिलने लगी
शर्त लेकिन थी की ये बुनियाद हिलनी चाहिए

हर सड़क पर हर गली में हर नगर हर गाँव में
हाथ लहराते हुए हर लाश चलनी चाहिए

सिर्फ़ हंगामा खड़ा करना मेरा मकसद नहीं
सारी कोशिश है की ये सूरत बदलनी चाहिए

मेरे सीने में नहीं तो तेरे सीने में सही
हो कहीं भी आग लेकिन आग जलनी चाहिए

-- By Dushyant Kumar

The Verdict

That's the title on CNN IBN by the way. Its all exit poll time, bookie time and speculation time. The world's largest elections are just over for the world's largest democracy. The elections that took a month to finish. Millions of people participated. Hats off to Election Commission for the fantastic hard work. Hats off to Police for their hard work in maintaining law and order.

As I kept on following the elections, I kept wondering if we are getting more and more divided. May be I am wrong. And I want to be wrong. But am I wrong? All discussions were very much based on divisions. All questions were centered around divisions. I could hear loud and clear, the following noises :

• Who are the Patels going to Vote for? Congress or Narendra Modi?
  
• How are the Dalits going to vote for Mayawati?
  
• How are muslim votes going to be shaped? For Congress? For Mulayam Singh?
• How is Congress doing among SC and STs?
  
• Who is more genuine in their Eelam support? Jayalalitha? Karunanidhi? Vaiko?
  
• Who will give Chandrasekhar Rao his separate state of Telangana?
  
• Who will help them in North Bengal to get a separate Gorkha Land?
  
• How will Chiranjeevi fair amongst Kapu community?
  

I shudder at the above questions. It makes me sad. It makes me nervous? Is this new? Or is it what that has defined India for centuries? Is it what the people want? What is more important for people? If the religion, caste, class is more important for people, then being a democracy, that is how the elections are going to be shaped.

I wish one party comes up and says "Thats it. Our agenda is united India where there is no division based on religion, class, caste. Our only agenda is clean society, honest society, equal opportunity for all". It is going to be a very difficult agenda. And I want to see people's responses.

I dream of the day where the agenda is only one thing : India and uplifting the masses of this country.

My dream is to see a political party that says : "I will support whoever comes to power if it helps stabilize the country".

Till then, the struggle continues. The horse trading continues. Several fronts will be formed. Several non-entities will be given unnecessary importance. The jokers in politicians will continue to amuse the people of this country. The people will cry within themselves while they externally laugh at the jokers.

But how can a change come if the people who complain give all kinds of excuses for not voting? Well, in a democracy, you have to take a stand.

And remember ! In a democracy, you get what you deserve. Unfortunate? But true.
You have the option to speak, fight, stand up, struggle, being ridiculed for wasting time and so on.

Atleast you can say : I tried.

On May 9, 2009 at Nanda Road : First hand account

On May 9, 2009, there was supposed to be a question and answer session with the Managing Director (MD) of BMRCL at Nanda Road. We woke up early in the morning and reached Nanda Road by 8:00 a.m. As we reached, we saw several enthusiastic people already there with several posters that read "Vote For Trees", "Save Trees" etc. with pictures of trees that were hand drawn.

There were also some posters that said "We Support Metro" with pictures of the faces of the presidents, secretary etc. of some organizations.

We all started chanting "Ulisi Ulisi Nand Road Ulisi", "Sarisi Sarisi Metro Saris", "Beke Beku Nyaaya Beku" etc. After a little while we came to know that the MD of BMRCL has arrived. So I was hoping that the interactive session would start. I was kind of excited about this. But pretty soon we realized that a group of people surrounded the MD and did not let him talk to us at all. Among these people, some faces that could be seen were the MLA, some office bearers of Federation of Jayanagar Residents Association etc. That was bizarre and insulting.

Why do you have avoid the bunch of peaceful protestors? Were they worried that they have no answers to difficult questions? Whatever the reason was, their gesture was demeaning, insulting and undemocratic. But we were also not willing to give up. We kept on speaking on the loudspeaker and kept urging the MD to address us. MLA was answerable to the public. MD of BMRCL was answerable to the public. Even police did not allow us to move closer to him. This clearly shows what can you expect from Police.

After 3 hours of relentless persistence, we heard the MD will address us. Did he have any other options? If he didnt, our next move was to go directly to MLA's house. People were fed up for being taken for granted.

Now started the most disappointing moment. Environmentalist Mr. Leo Saldanha first asked about the zig-zag nature of Metro for which MD gave some answers. After this, the MLA Vijay Kumar wanted to say something. When Leo was telling about how even Mr. Vijay Kumar supported us in the past, suddenly some bullies started shouting. Even Mr. Vijay Kumar started shouting. For a moment, I started thinking if I am in the middle of the hooligans who are with the MLA. One of the hooligans was shouting in a threating manner towards Leo.

The other person was Mr. Keshava Kumar. He is supposedly the secretary of the Federation of Jayanagar Residents Association. But the way he was behaving himself reminded me of some roadside hooligan. His gesture of showing his index finger towards a young lady was so shameful. And by the way, this is my first hand eye witness account.

And we call ourselves democratic where these kind of goondaism behaviors are acceptable?

Next disappointing moment was that the MD and his group spent hardly an hour with us. For such a huge project which is worth almost Rs. 9000 crores, dont the public have the right to ask questions? How long can we remain passive in this country?

The MD and his group hardly answered a question or two and left. Several questions remained unanswered.

Prof. B K Chandrasekhar, ex minister addressed the crowd as well.

Several questions remain unanswered.
In a democracy people have to take a stand. Based on an informed decision.

Otherwise, we will be a perennially complaining citizenry, complaining about how things are bad in our society. So we should rather step up and do whatever we can so that we can atleast say "I tried".

I was uninitiated to the campaign to Save Lalbagh and save the environment. But after I looked into certain stuff, I decide to take part in this campaign.

And I continue to learn more and more.

Save Nanda Road, Save Lalbagh

May 9 2009 : Save Bangalore Protest

Namma Bengalura a.k.a My Bangalore

The Bangalore temperatures have gone up. It has been extremely hot this summer for sure. By the way, Bangalore International Airport has come up. Bangalore Metro is being built.

We are getting modernized. We are developing. Hurray!!!

But in the middle of all these, someone is getting massacred. The ones which give life to us. But we refuse to acknowledge. The ones which give us peace. But we refuse to acknowledge. The ones that protect us from flooding. But we refuse to acknowledge.

And those are the precious and valuable trees of Bangalore. The tree that have been the heritage of this beautiful city. The trees that played a significant role in getting this city to be called beautiful. The tress that played a role in getting this city called air-conditioned city.

But here we are, human beings, once again back with our stupidity and our desire to not value what we have, our inability to respect and appreciate our wealth of environment, hell-bent to cut these trees, massacre them. Because, we need development. Development through destruction. Destruction of our live provider and the life provider for several other species.

Well, in such a case, here are the things we can do

• We sit idle and complain few years from now on how the city has become polluted and has become hotter and so on. And blame it on some dishonest folks. But who lost? We.
  
• Alternatively, we put in our effort without worrying whether we will succeed or we lose. But we know that we listened to our hearts and decided to act in a way that our future generations would look up to us and not as cheats
  

If we want to put in our efforts to stop blatant murder of our beautiful environment in the garb of development, start participating. Join the folks who are spearheading this effort to save Namma Bengaluru.

http://www.hasiruusiru.org

Let us put small efforts so we can, at the least, tell our souls that I tried.

Save Lalbagh, Save Bangalore

Please read it and if you agree, please go ahead and sign it :

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/savelalbaghfrommetro/index.html

The above is about the impact on Lalbagh, the heritage of Bangalore and India, by the metro.

More coming on this blog in the coming few days.