Some fancy ideas for mass transport

srkulhalli - 24-OCT-2008

Got these when I was browsing around. Kind of exotic - enjoy wwwa.vito.be/FADC/report1/10_Ankur%20Bhatnagar_UniModal.pdf http://www.unimodal.net/

Hearing pursuant to the appeal under RTI in the case of the Indiranagar Tree Felling

murali772 - 20-JUL-2010

With the BBMP tree officer remaing silent to the RTI query raised by me on the 10th April, in the matter of the apparently unauthorised tree felling on 100 ft road in Indiranagar (check this), I had sent an appeal to the Commissioner, BBMP, on the 28th June.

Scrap Karnataka Prevention of Slaughter and Preservation of Cattle Bill / Act 2010 - Petitions

indian - 16-JUL-2010

The maximum imprisonment for violating the provisions of the 1964 Act was 06 months whereas the 2010 Bill/Act prescribes imprisonment extending up to 07 years. It is this that has made people question the intentions of the State BJP (right wing) government as in the Indian Penal Code (IPC), imprisonment for such long terms is usually meant for crimes of a far more heinous nature.

The latest Karnataka Prevention of Slaughter and Preservation of Cattle Bill / Act 2010 virtually equates the killing of a cow with the murder of a human. (It's only the economically weaker sections of the society who consume/eat beef in India.)

An offender may be imprisoned from 01-07 years and fined between Rs. 25,000-50,000 or Rs.1 lakh. Draws the lines - us and them, the beef-eaters and those who don't, the killers (bad ones) and the pious/good ones. Reinforces those lines with the draconian, absolute and brutal police power of the State behind one particular section. Removes any distinction between "cow" and "cattle".

ITIR - Gaining Momentum

Ravi_D - 16-JUL-2010

GOK passed the ITIR Act 2010 on Thursday, becoming the first state to do so. Per this DH Report:

The ITIR Act, 2010 will enable the state to attract a whopping Rs.2 trillion (Rs.2 lakh crore) global investments in the knowledge sector, boost exports and create 3 million jobs in a decade

Open Data progress - met with dept. of Sericulture

silkboard - 15-JUL-2010

So after 2 months of pause - we have been struggling to work meeting dates with some govt depts we have spoken with - we kicked this off with a meeting with Manivanan, who now heads dept of Sericulture.

Counting the poor - how many do we have?

silkboard - 15-JUL-2010

Public Agenda dear, here is that intellectually ruminating discussion we said we will have soon. How many poor people do we have in our country? The debate, and understanding the number is important because the classic quote goes - "you can't fix what you can't measure". If you can't count your poor, you can't check how your poverty alleviation programs are working.

Two important things around which disagreements arise are 1) How do you define a poor household? 2) How exactly do you count people using the poverty definition you accept?

First of all, the two popular stats that are quoted to start a discussions like this

• Arjun Sengupta - 77% of Indians lived on less than Rs 20 a day.
• Suresh Tendulkar co. - Poverty ratio at the all India level ... 37.2% in 2004-05. Rural poverty ... 41.8% and urban ... 25.7%. Criteria, spend per person per month. Rs446.68 in rural areas. Rs578.8 in urban. (see http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_an-honest-measure-of-poverty_1323446)

Some other notable stats:

Right is there; but, no information

murali772 - 14-JUL-2010

Following (in italics) are the relevant excerpts from the New Indian Express report:

The government may have enacted a law empowering citizens to demand information from public authorities, but five years later many government departments are yet to take the “first step” towards proactive disclosure. Section 4(1)(b) of the RTI act mandates that all authorities under the purview of the law must index, catalogue and computerise official records to be easily accessed by the people. So far, however, few departments have paid heed to the provision, says K A Thippeswamy, Karnataka State Information Commissioner. The progress, he said, has been “almost negligible”. “They (departments) do not even have a record room to keep  documents,” he said. “They were supposed to do it within six months of the Act coming into force. But it’s been five years and they are yet to do it.’’

GIM - Beyond Bangalore, Business World

silkboard - 12-JUL-2010

Read some coverage of GIM in BusinessWorld, (Beyond Bangalore). Must say that beyond Bangalore is a nice topic for the article, here are some intereasting bits:

... projects, if they all take off, will see Rs 4 lakh crore being invested ... Almost 65 per cent of these projects are in the iron and steel sector ... in Bellary.

The stat that Karnataka needs to change is this ...

Karnataka ... single-city economy. Bengaluru ... accounts for over 55-60 per cent of the state’s GDP, according to Aroon Raman, chairman of CII-Karnataka.

An interesting angle on iron ore controversy. Will illegal activity go away, be legalized now!?

Citizen participation in governance

idontspam - 7-JUL-2010

Can non IAS/Politico citizens add value to governance?

Dozens of dapperly dressed young people gathered to attend a conference entitled, "Exploring Spaces for Young Indians in Government."

Suri, who is spending the summer assisting the office of Sachin Pilot, Minister of State for Communications and Technology, is among the growing ranks of young Indians who are showing an increasing interest in exploring careers in public policy and government - areas in which Indian civil servants have had a historical monopoly.

Counter-intuitively, the majority of the attendees were young people comfortably ensconced in private sector jobs. If these two things are anything to go by, then it strongly signals a slow but steady shift in the years and decades to come, towards a younger, more inclusive and level playing field in India's governing fabric, which will ultimately bode well for its nation-building project.

Why should I support this Bandh?

silkboard - 5-JUL-2010

Why should I be forced to support a strike call (bandh) that I don't agree with? Where is my freedom of expression? Why is my office shut? Why is my son's school shut as well? Are the officea and schools shut because they support the bandh, or are they 'scared'? Why can state government not guarantee rule of law on general bandh day? Real shame in today's day and age, such "goonda-giri' driven bandhs are the most farcical tools of public vote in a democracy.

Leaving aside the "how can a ruling party support a strike" thing and talking specifics, what is wrong  with total decontrol of fuel pricess to let the market forces rule? Kerosene price rise can be buffered towards a gradual decontrol, but the public needs to alter their fuel usage pattern - shift the burden away from fossils - and energy companies need that push to innovate.