Chennai Times

The new tamil year came in with a large promotion of an 'integrated city' coming up in the neighbourhood...news papers carried special advertisement features, a popular filmstar was on television through the day promoting the same, there are hoarding all over the chennai city promoting an 'integrated city' in chennai. This new 'city' promotes walking!!! The ad.s read, 'walk to work', 'walk for entertainment', 'walk to the club', 'walk to school',...and it promised a lot of greenery all around. It also claimed to be the first integrated city around the chennai city! Strange suckers we are! A city that was to begin with had much walk ways (foot paths, platforms, whatever you call them), destroyed them systematically (and the cycle ways too in the process) to ensure that citizens were discouraged to walk, they were further discouraged to cross the roads through the building of large boulders for road medians with the authorities yet ...

The old Gandhian of Chennai often fighting the mighty single handedly, Sri. P.N. Srinivasan is planning a meeting to celebrate the centenary of Satyagraha at the Marina Beach at the Thilagar Thidal (this place is located behind the current subway near Kannagi Statue, a small cement platform where Bal Gangadhara Tilak had once addressed a public gathering - recognition and restoration is one of the causes that PNS fights for) on the 10th of April 2007 evening between 5 p.m. and 9 p.m. If you are interested to meet some old (and a few not so old) Gandhians of Chennai please do make it. I also wanted to mention two other events of Gandhian institutions in Chennai that I am aware of (and have tried to participate at some point): 1. The weekly book review that is held at the Gandhi Study Centre - this happens every wednesday evening between 6 - 8 p.m. Gandhi Study Centre is the one institution everyone knows thanks to the dynamic leadership of Sri. Annamalai and Smt. Prema Annamalai. All ki...

From the 10th to the 12th of March, a collection of photographs by photo-journalist Vijay Kranti is on at the Lakshana Art Gallery in Mylapore. I have had the opportunity to interact with the Tibetan student community (TSAM - Tibetan Students Association of Madras) in Chennai many years back when I accompanied them on an awareness cycle rally across the state and it was good occasion to renew oneself with one of the most peaceful struggles in the world when I attended the inauguration ceremony of the photo exhibition on the 10th March (yesterday). Something interesting from the speech of the photographer, Mr. Kranti - he said that it is in India's interest to have a peaceful Tibet as that would cut down Indian government's expenditure on border maintenance with China! Wonder what would be a response to this from those who believe that India ought not to too overtly support Tibetan cause as it upsets our relationship with China and currently our relationship with China is impor...

This news item caught my eye: In blogging, Chennai scores over Mumbai According to this Chennai has more bloggers than other IT cities in India...conservative Chennai eager to communicate? Tamilian like yapping for sure...forever arattai arangams of different natures are the proof. But still inadequate is the number to generate a free tamil translation from english web page...surprisingly there are no on-line instant translation from english to tamil software!! These blogs that I write can be translated and read in quite a few other languages now (check it online, scroll to the end of the page for translation to Japanese, Korean, Chinese, French, etc.), tried to find out who offers an Indian language translation, tamil in particular...no one!!!

In a sense, 2006 has been a year when a gradual transformation has taken place from a parliamentary democracy to a judicial courtocracy. More and more issues of public policy - be it the height of a dam or the areas to be sealed - are decided in courts and not in legislatures or cabinet meetings. The union cabinet can decide on reservation policies, the court is inclined to question them. Chief ministers can give the green signal to setting up special economic zones, public interest litigations can challenge the policy in court. Even MPs disqualified by parliament in the cash for questions sting can go to the court seeking redressal. The above is from Rajdeep Sardesai, one of our most seen television faces in his blog. Maybe, that is another view. But, then the judiciary doesn't have plans, doesn't have the systems in place to attend to issues and (notwithstanding some rare examples) is not meant to be pro-active. Like I said in my first write-up on this issue, the judiciary w...

About 5.7 lakh people in Chennai with a monthly income of Rs. 2,000 or less will receive free dhotis and saris for Pongal. This morning newspaper provides an example of what the urban slums are useful for. I wonder how many of this 5.7 lakh are part of the displaced population, quite a few of them seem to have ration cards. Would they still count of as BPL in Chennai metropolis, readily available for such largess by the politicians? By the way, 5.7 lakh is more than 10% of Chennai population according to the Census of 2001.

CHENNAI: Houses of about three lakh people living along the city's waterways are facing demolition. Authorities are preparing for an all-out eviction drive against encroachers along the Adyar and Cooum rivers and Buckingham Canal under the Chennai City River Conservation Project ( CCRCP ). The official estimate of the number of families facing eviction is 33,313. Of these, residents of 8,164 tenements — nearly 40,000 people — who live in areas that hinder the ongoing desilting efforts will be evicted and resettled on the city outskirts. "Nearly 6,624 families have encroached upon the banks of the Adyar , 8,266 along the Cooum and 18,243 along Buckingham Canal. All of them will be resettled and efforts will be made to provide them alternative livelihood opportunities where they are relocated," Department of Environment officials — the nodal agency for CCRCP — told this newspaper. It is a grand move b...