BMTC - S1 Route (Vijayanagar to Vijayanagar)

Ravi_D - 9-APR-2010

Saw these buses plying on outer ring road near BTM layout yesterday & today.

Looks like an extension of Big10 concept, Big10 to Circle Routes to S (not sure what it stands for) routes?

Surprisingly, while the BMTC call center did not have any detail to offer, the buses seemed to quite fully loaded!. I got bumped from the call center guy to the control room to Vijayanagar Bus Stand (22952362). All were cordial, willing to help, but had no info to offer.

Karnataka State pollution control board (KSPCB) - active?

manjari - 8-APR-2010

They have 10 offices in Bangalore alone (isnt that good news ;)
They have a lot of laboratories which are set up for KSPCB for data analysis and data gathering.
  
The site says "Samples collected by the Regional Offices of the Board, Industries, Organizations and from general public are analysed."
When i read this I only get evil ideas (evil because it might not be fun for a lot of people)

They have listed a number of parameter that they analyze.
Industrial waste water has: 41 parameters
Air: 6 parameters
Water: 26 parameters.

They have things like "monthly avg result of national ambient air quality" and "classification of river water quality as per GEMS and MINARS"
The only small, tiny winy problem is they have failed to update any new reports and the last one is of 2007.

The last annual plan has been put up for year 2006-2007.

So I have a simple question, what happened to KSPCB? Does it exist? If it does then where are the reports?
If they have reports then cant we file RTI to get it?

Renewing DL at the RTO without touts/bribes

s_yajaman - 8-APR-2010

 My wife and I went yesterday to the Indiranagar RTO to renew her DL.  As soon as we stepped into "the zone" there were touts offering help.  We, of course, ignored them and walked up to the RTO.  

As we walked up we realized that my wife's DL said "RTO BNG CENTRAL" (Koramangala) and we wondered what trouble that would mean.  But we decided to check anyway.

There was a helpdesk there.  It was operational.  We asked the lady there if we could renew the license here.  She gave us the forms and asked us to check at Window 3 if it was possible.  We also realized there was a medical fitness certificate (completely in Kannada) to be got from a doctor.

At Window 3 there was a reasonably helpful lady.  She told my wife that it was possible to do it there.  She confirmed if the address remained unchanged.  She asked us to write a letter requesting that the license be renewed there.   

We paid the Rs.250 fee at the cash counter and my wife went to get her MC done.

Bangalore Patrol

manjari - 7-APR-2010

Times of India along with Janaagrah launch Bangalore Patrol (starting tomorrow) says the cover page of TOI today. I tried to look for it online but couldnt find a thing about the same. But if you have a TOI around check it out, it is impossible to miss.

According to the Advertisement "Bangalore patrol involves a stringent ward infrastructure and services assessment programme with the singular aim of demanding direct evaluating and accountability from the local administrative and governance system."

They will start with 5 essential civic rights of water supply, Mobility, Sanitation, Environment and Public amenities.

It will measure the same in 198 wards. By doing so they intend to monitor the work of our newly elected representative's in each of the wards. In my opinion the best measure of performance and also at the same time we get a good idea about our city.
According to the article "Progress report will be based on simple objective performance evaluation criteria and will be freely available to the public, empowering them to demand answers" 

The Lok Satta Party public interactions meet with JP

psaram42 - 7-APR-2010

 After the recent BBMP election JP is visiting Bangalore in carrying forward the new party’s agenda. This interaction reminded us the probable scenario which might have prevailed at the time of freedom struggle.  The fight now is against the middle class apathy ignorance and above all their pretence to know best according to JP.

JP stressed on the importance of local government. An increase in per capita income alone may make the country rich but still a banana republic. He felt that with proper management the malaise like power cuts etc can be avoided altogether.

To days scenario highlights the viciously guarded statues quo by our politicians. The confused nonchalance and apathy of the voters is a boon to them. Many levels of changes are needed. JP alluded to the two major types of corruption, the extortional and collusive type of corruption. Both kind of corruption are to be tackled.

IISc Alumina Association (IIScAA) Science Forum – Popular Lecture Series

psaram42 - 3-APR-2010

To enhance the scientific temperament amongst the community at large and inspire young aspirants in particular, IIScAA Science Forum – Popular Lecture Series was launched today at the Faculty Hall at IISc campus. It was hoped to promote the quality of the dialogue on the new roles and challenges of scientific knowledge within today’s global society. 

IIScAA Science Forum would be disseminating the emerging frontiers of Science & Technology globally to the society, along with history & philosophy, discoveries, inventions, revolutions, limitations, use & abuse of Science & Technology and the impact of Science & Technology on society. The IIScAA Science Forum will also share with the society the contribution of IISc in Science & Technology by arranging Lectures by eminent scientists of repute from IISc & outside. 

The upcoming BMR bill - draft

silkboard - 29-MAR-2010

Continuing from the mention of two clear asks post BBMP elections, here is a regional governance reform proposal being prepared by Abide. The close to final draft of Bangalore Metropolitan Regional governance act is attached. Here are some mention worthy points. Detailed review will be very much appreciated by those who may be looking for them. Talk sense and less-rhetoric as much as possible please.

The dry leaves disposal problem.

psaram42 - 22-MAR-2010

As the spring season comes every year there is the dry leaves season preceding it. The street sweepers have hectic work gathering the dry leaves by sweeping them into big mounds. It is really funny that the regular garbage collectors are no way responsible for the leaves final disposal.

Bad Planning by Mantri Mall Malleswaram

ranga - 21-MAR-2010

Quite a few days back i wrote about the Bad planning of Bigbazaar, where their were very less parking space made available and the vehicles hundreds of them parked on the road or adjecent bylanes, creating major traffic jams in that area.

Now it is the turn of Mantri Mall @ Malleswaram, in the weekend of last week and this week, the entire area is in a  mess, by 4 pm in the evening( when i crossed that area) , the mall has put a sign board saying the parking is full. You can see hundreds of vehicles both two wheelers and four wheelers being parked in the adjacent roads, creating traffic jam, which amounted to about 45 mins of travel for a short distance of half a  KM. You can see people with vehicles arguing with the police and the mall's security guards for parking.

New navigation on Praja

tech - 23-MAR-2010

We at the tech team are happy to announce new and improved navigation features on Praja.in. These will be launched today. We hope that the changes make it easier for our users to find, read and create relevant content on the site. Read on to know more about the new navigation.

Changed front page

The homepage of Praja (http://praja.in) now has a simplified look when you are not logged in. It has a small slideshow to tell what Praja is about and leads to creating or finding discussions. (We are currently working on improving the looks of the graphics and buttons on this page). This design is done keeping in mind the new users to the Praja community who want to understand what Praja is about.

When the users login, the front page will automatically change to a more personal version. This page is the centre of all the action on Praja for all the users.

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