I spent some significant years during my childhood in the city, then called Bangalore. Since my father was in a job that entailed frequent shifts, my second longest duration in a single city during my years of education were spent here; the longest was Mumbai (then, Bombay). Subsequently, after moving from Mumbai, I have spent a majority of my adult life in Bengaluru. I am half Kannadiga and half Maharashtrian, but I see myself, now, as more Kannadiga for obvious reasons. Ofcourse, while growing up, we spoke English at home, with adequate spicing of Kannada and Marathi, sometimes also adding ingredients of the local language. In school, it was always English. Among friends it was English-Kannada-Hindi, depending on the background of the friend/s. I have learnt to read and write Kannada with the primary intention of reading the wonderful literature that the language has to offer, but I am still getting there.
My memories, from my childhood, of Bengaluru are of a cool, salubrious climate through the year, lots of green cover, a friendly local population and a public transport system that was adequate for the population of the city. We lived in what is now the centre of the city and along with my siblings, I would visit the Jaycees park and library on St. Marks road and the library in Cubbon Park, go roller skating in Kanteerva Stadium, cycle through Richmond and Residency roads, enjoy the kulfi at the stall near Bowring Institute and watch some lovely movies at the auditorium in Bal Bhavan. We walked to most of these places, some times cycling down, too. I cycled to school when I was in primary school and later used the public bus after moving school. We attended theatre and music concerts, went house-to-house distributing ‘yellu-achchu-khabbu’ during Sankranti, sweets during diwali and also engaged in carol singing with a group that went from house to house!
As a 12 year old I travelled almost 18 kms a day to school and back home, changing buses either at the Majestic or Shivajinagar terminus. The bus driver on my return journey was very kind hearted and always reserved a seat for me; if I weren’t at the bus stop by 4:05 p.m., he would wait a few minutes for me. Some ladies on my travel to school became protective of me. But I had the first experience of abuse when I was about 13 1/2, when a man sitting at the exit squeezed my breasts as I was getting off. I was shaken. A few senior schoolmates, who were with me, noticed something amiss and but I didn’t even know what to tell them as I fought tears that were welling up in my eyes. On returning home, I ran to my mother, explaining to her as best as I could, given my innocence and limited vocabulary regarding these things at the time. When my father heard of my experience, he taught me how to kick such men where it hurts. I can’t even imagine what my father must have gone through to tell me something like that, given the very conservative background that he grew up in. For a few days, my brother would escort me to the bus stop and while returning my friends would ‘protect’ me. But my impression of the city and its people changed. I began looking at every man with suspicion and I was overcome by a strange fear. It took a city like Mumbai to make me firebrand and gutsy all over again!
By the time I returned to the city again I was an adult and the IT industry had already taken root here. It was under Shri. Ramakrishna Hegde as Chief Minister that many IT companies were encouraged to make Bengaluru their home. There was an influx of people and slowly, but surely, things began to change - some for the better, some not so. Under Shri. S.M. Krishna, the BATF was set up as a Public Private Partnership to enable the various administrative and civic bodies to come together to handle the development and growth of the city. (The BATF was disbanded and a new Vision Group was formed many years later, in 2014, by Shri. Siddaramaiah.) Many analysts opine that this development has been good for the city but has not been able to make a foray into the other parts of the State. Whether the government of the day should have ensured equitable development of the State is for anyone to debate upon. Personally, I feel that it may have been a good idea to distribute it to ensure development of other towns of the State and also leverage the burden that it was putting on a single city.
With the incentives that the subsequent governments gave IT companies, Bengaluru became the favourite city to set up home - the many engineering colleges that provided local talent and the wonderful weather were the bonuses!
Bangalore became Bengaluru, the ‘Pensioner’s Paradise’ and ‘Garden City’ became the ‘IT Capital/Silicon Valley of India’ and a concrete jungle. It became a metropolitan city in the true sense of the term and the city began growing rapidly way beyond the Ashoka Pillars! High rise apartments, high-end/luxury cars, International schools, hotels and restaurants and malls and international retail brands made their way into the city. And you don’t get to hear much of Kannada being spoken anymore. (Before I begin speaking with someone offering services, I give them a choice now - “Kannada, Telugu, Tamil, Hindi, English?”).
But the civic agencies couldn’t keep pace with the growing demands on the limited resources that the city had on offer. Striking a balance between the green cover that was a pride of the city, and the need for infrastructure, has many a time brought the citizen and the authorities in a confrontation. Since the only source of water supply to the city is the Cauvery river, the need for more water resulted in indiscriminate tapping of ground water; housing for the rich and nouveau riche resulted in clusters of high rises, increasing the population density of many areas, greater than the infrastructure there could support. Vehicular traffic has increased manifold and getting stuck in traffic jams seems to be the new way to travel! Poor public transport connecting the newly developed areas and last mile connectivity to these areas makes one prefer to have their own vehicle. But this is only to do with the developmental aspects of the city.
Socially and culturally, too, the city has seen a change. There is resentment and aspiration juxtaposed dangerously, causing an increase in crime rates against women, and men alike. There is also the baggage of misogyny and a patriarchal mindset that has compounded the problems. The city needs to see a multidimensional change - in the infrastructure, in the mindset of the people and in the response of authorities to be able to preempt distasteful situations.
We have about slightly more than half of Mumbai’s population but twice as many vehicles on the road. In many ways, I believe that the city needs to take a leaf out of Mumbai’s story - good public transport system, man-made lakes for water supply, well developed and self sufficient neighbourhoods and a vigilant society to help authorities control crime.
This is the city that has given me many wonderful memories. This is the city that’s my home. But in my head, I have still not been able to reconcile with the change that this city has witnessed. And I don’t think this is only my problem.
One of my favourites, from Hosa Belaku!
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