Puerto Rico has frequently been in Trump’s crosshairs.
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Tuesday, December 17, 2019
Meet Bengaluru’s vibrant community of birdwatchers
Bengaluru also has a birding/nature group called Bngbirds, which organises walks, open to everyone, to different birding hotspots on the first four Sundays of every month.
Photo credit: Deepa Mohan
Sunday mornings at Bengaluru’s Lalbagh Botanical Garden are usually filled with fitness enthusiasts, yogis, fruit hawkers, and a group of inquisitive people staring up at trees with great enthusiasm. Some of these people have cameras as well, the shutters clicking non-stop. For many years now, Bengaluru has been host to a very healthy community of birdwatchers and nature enthusiasts, some of who have been in the field for decades and some who only saw turned up for their first session last week. The city’s salubrious climate, its lakes and gardens provide ample opportunity for birds to find food and shelter, and so the community has been able to spot many a species within the city and on the outskirts. With awareness regarding the natural world spreading on social media, it was only natural that the brigade of city residents find each other and bond over their mutual love for flora and fauna. The News Minute spoke to a few of the community’s members, both experienced and new alike. Deepa Mohan, an active birder from the city, says she always used to observe the natural world since she was a child, but only started focussing on birdwatching after her daughter grew up and left home. Sumeet, an IT employee and more recently turned nature lover, had this to say: “It’s only been a month since I started birding. I’m more of a photographer and nature is something I enjoy photographing. I took a larger interest in bird photography after a naturalist friend once accompanied me on a nature outing.” Birdwatchers patiently wait for birds flying around in the canopy | Photo by Deepa Mohan Satish Iyer, an academic who teaches animation, modelling and designing, says, “As a person who works with references from the outside world a lot, I was introduced to birding when I had to create a few sketches of birds for an assignment. I wasn’t interested in birdwatching prior to this, although I did have an inclination towards the natural world. It began with seeing the more common species, of course, and my interest was piqued when I began observing their behaviour more closely.” From there on, Satish began documenting the various bird life and other fauna he encountered around his neighbourhood, and now runs a blog where his images are neatly categorised. It’s not just individuals who participate in activities. “Bengaluru is blessed in having an umbrella birding/nature group called Bngbirds, which organises walks (open to everyone) to different birding hotspots and other locations on the first four Sundays of every month. This has been a major help to me, and I now conduct the fourth Sunday walk. Joining these walks would be a great way to improve one’s birding knowledge,” says Deepa. The group, which recently completed 21 years, has over 1,900 members now, and moved from a mailing list on Yahoo to Facebook. Birdwatching also offers immense scope for citizen science. City enthusiasts regularly upload data to E-Bird, a platform to find checklists. It is especially useful to log record sightings (for instance, when a migratory bird called the Demoiselle Crane that was previously never seen in Bengaluru was sighted in the city). A female Shikra, a bird of prey commonly found in Bengaluru | Photo by Abhilash Pavuluri Contributors also take part in the Indian edition of the Great Background Bird Count, a day when birders prepare a checklist of birds commonly found in their areas and submit a report of sightings by the end of the day. The activity is meant to provide real time data about how these species are doing, and the year-over-year changes compared to previous data. Regular events apart from the bird walks are also conducted: seminars, outreach programmes, and recreational activities. The HSBC Bird Race that takes place every January is a good example: the city’s birders form teams and set out to record the maximum number of birds that can be found within a 50 km radius of Bengaluru, before sunset. The fourteenth edition of this event will be held in January 2020. But how easy is it to get into the hobby? In the author’s opinion, there is literally no equipment required to get into birdwatching. Your naked eyes and a keen sense of observation are all that are required to begin with. A lot of birders usually use little else. From there, the equipment largely depends on what you’d like to do as a birder. Most birders prefer to have a bridge camera, a good pair of binoculars, a notepad, and that’s it. This author too, had a similar story. He started birdwatching five years ago and now teaches newer birders the ropes, usually at his regular haunts in the Bannerghatta region. Abhilash Pavuluri is a Bengaluru-based photographer, writer and aspiring naturalist.
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Fourth MEMU suburban train introduced between Bengaluru-Mysuru, to run daily
The trains will stop at Yeshwantpur, KSR Majestic, Kengeri, and Mandya en route.
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In what is the fourth Mainline Electric Multiple Unit (MEMU) train between Mysuru and Bengaluru, the South Western Railway (SWR) on Monday introduced daily train service from Yehalanka to Mysuru and back. The train from Bengaluru starts at 2:30 am in the morning from Yehalanka and reaches Mysuru at 5:35 am. The train stops at Yeshwantpur, KSR Majestic, Kengeri, Mandya, Mysuru. At a flat fare of Rs 30 per passenger, one can reach Mysuru from Bengaluru’s Yehalanka in around three hours and the child fare for the same trip is Rs 15. The trains will have a capacity to carry around 3,500 passengers at a time. The first such train from Mysuru started on Monday while the first train from Yehalanka left on Tuesday. The Mysuru-Bengaluru train will start at 10:30 pm in the night and reach Yehalanka by 1:30 am. Railway officials said apart from the regular passengers travelling between these cities, it is targeted at those flying out and reaching the Kempegowda International Airport from Mysuru. The trains will have two special pink coaches reserved for women. With this, the number of trains running between Mysuru and Bengaluru is 34. This includes six weekly trains, three bi-weekly trains, one tri-weekly train, one six-days-a-week and 23 daily trains. Inaugurating the train, Mysuru-Kodagu MP Pratap Simha thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Rail Minister Piyush Goyal and Minister of State, Railways, Suresh Angadi. The other three MEMU trains have stops at Krishnadevaraya Halt, Nayandahalli, Jnanabharathi Halt, Kengeri, Hejjala, Bidadi, Ketohalli Halt, Ramanagaram, Channapattana, Mandya, Pandavapura and Srirangapattana. MEMU rakes provide an average increase in speed of 20km/hour compared to loco-hauled commuter trains pulled by a separate engine. While MEMUs are a preferred mode for suburban trains, it was not common in this part of the railway network as it was fully electrified only in 2018. The first such train was introduced in December 2018 and proved to be a relief for daily commuters travelling from Mysuru, Mandya, Maddur and Channapattana to reach the suburban areas of Bengaluru like Nayandahalli, Kengeri and Hejjala.
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11 Bengaluru college students detained for protesting against CAA, released later
"They are in college to study but they can't be blind to injustice as that is not what education is about," Sukanya Sreenivas, the mother of one of the students said.
Students in Bengaluru who turned up at the protest organised against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) were in for a rude shock on Tuesday when police officials detained eleven of them from the Puttana Chetty Town Hall, the site of the protest. The flashpoint between students and police officials occurred at around 12 pm near Town Hall. Two students studying in a prominent college in central Bengaluru were detained by police officials as soon as they reached the protest site. "The police took us away in a car and also confiscated our phones so we could not contact our parents or lawyers. We repeatedly asked the police if we could make a call but we were denied permission until more students were detained," one of the students told TNM after they were released. Soon after, at around 12:15 pm, a group of four students from various colleges in Bengaluru were seen embroiled in a discussion with KS Tanveer Ahmed, the inspector of the jurisdictional SJ Park Police Station. Following a heated discussion about the denial of permission to hold the protest in Town Hall, Tanveer urged the students to leave the protest site. When the students continued to resist, police officials detained four students. Another video of students detained near Town Hall in Bengaluru. Protest against CAA by students was denied permission, police say. pic.twitter.com/UmW59qZvOu — Prajwal (@prajwalmanipal) December 17, 2019 Subsequently, five more students were detained by the police taking the total number of students detained to 11. Police officials told TNM that the students were detained since they did not have permission for the protest at Town Hall. A separate protest was taking place at the time by members of the Hadapada community, a sub-sect of the Lingayat community who are originally from Karnataka. "We detained the students because they did not have permission for the protest. They were denied permission yesterday and we took 11 students into preventive custody," KS Tanveer Ahmed said. The students were released around 3 pm. All students detained during CAA protests in Bengaluru will be released shortly. Students were detained after police denied permission for a protest at Town Hall at 12 pm. pic.twitter.com/MQwFduq6Mj — Prajwal (@prajwalmanipal) December 17, 2019 The organisers of the protest then decided to march from Kanteerava Stadium to Freedom Park instead of gathering at Town Hall. Students and working professionals chanted slogans and held up placards criticising the central government's decision to enact the CAA. One placard read, "When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty," quoting the phrase popularised by former American president Thomas Jefferson.
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Buses to now ply to and from KSR Majestic Railway Station in Bengaluru
The bus service was inaugurated on Monday by Bengaluru Central MP, PC Mohan and BMTC Chairman NS Nandiesha Reddy, along with other dignitaries.
The much needed bus service from Krantivira Sangolli Rayanna (KSR) Railway Station in Majestic to different parts of Bengaluru was inaugurated on Monday by Bengaluru Central MP, PC Mohan and BMTC Chairman NS Nandiesha Reddy. Other dignitaries present at the inaugural ceremony included BMTC MD C Shikha, BMTC Director (Security and Vigilance) Anupam Agrawal, Divisional Railway Manager Ashok Kumar Verma, and Additional Divisional Railway Manager Kalyani Scthuraman. While the launch of this project was due for earlier this month, it had to be postponed due to the Model Code of Conduct put in place for the bye-polls. From now on, buses will be available from the third entrance which opens to Platform 1 of the railway station and also has the Kempegowda Metro Station in the vicinity. In the introductory phase of the service, the buses will go to peripheral areas of the city like Kadugodi, Hoskote, Attibele, Sarjapur, Yelahanka and Nagawara. In total, there will be 54 trips covered by this buses with nine trips for each of the areas on the outskirts, starting from 6 am to 10:30 pm in the night. This move by the BMTC comes after it signed up Kannada film star Puneeth Rajkumar to be its brand ambassador on Friday. In the previous week, the BMTC along with the traffic police and BBMP, had held a bus yatra to promote the ‘Nimbus’ which runs on the bus priority lane (BPL) on Outer RIng Road between KR Puram and Silk Board. Under this BPL system, the left lane of this entire stretch is reserved only for BMTC Nimbus buses. Nimbus is short for Nimma Bus, meaning ‘your bus’ in Kannada. This is done to ensure that BMTC buses travel faster, and people are motivated to ditch private vehicles in favour of the bus. This is aimed at ultimately reducing congestion on the roads and pollution.
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RSS man booked for making Karnataka school students reenact Babri Masjid demolition
Four persons, including RSS leader Kalladka Prabhakar Bhat, have been booked under Sections 295A and 298 of the IPC.
Police in Karnataka have booked members of the governing body of a school run by the RSS in Dakshina Kannada’s Bantwal after a video of students re-enacting the 1992 Babri Masjid demolition was circulated. Dakshina Kannada Superintendent of Police Laxmi Prasad told TNM that Kalladka Prabhakar Bhat, Narayan Somayyaji, Vasanth Madhav and Chinnappa Kotiyan have been named in the FIR registered under Sections 295A (Deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings) and 298 (Uttering, words, etc., with deliberate intent to wound the religious feelings of any person) of the Indian Penal Code by Bantwal Town police. The FIR was registered based on a complaint by Aboobacker Siddique, a PFI activist and resident of the same area as the school's. Read: Karnataka school run by RSS leader makes kids ‘demolish’ Babri Masjid in a play TNM has earlier reported how the Sunday’s event at Sri Rama Vidyakendra High School in Kalladka in Bantwal was attended by Union Minister of Chemicals and Fertilizers, DV Sadananda Gowda; Puducherry Governor Kiran Bedi; and several ministers from Karnataka. The school is owned by RSS leader and the organisation's south-central region executive committee member, Kalladka Prabhakar Bhat. Prabhakar Bhat is a powerful RSS leader in the coastal belt of Karnataka. When TNM asked Bhat about his defiance in not following the Supreme Court’s observations regarding the mosque demolition, he said, ““Even though the Supreme Court has said that what happened in Babri was wrong, we have questioned that part of the judgment itself. We cannot accept everything that is said in the judgment. I don't agree with it,” Kalladka Bhat even said that he felt nothing was wrong in showcasing a play on what he believes is a historical event. “It is not a mosque. It is just a building. It is a historical event that we are depicting. We have depicted Jallianwala Bagh as well. Did anyone highlight that? There are hundreds of instances like this and we have to show the injustices that have happened in our country,” he added.
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Despite row over police permission, scores attend Bengaluru protest against CAA
More than five hundred people stood in solidarity with the students of Jamia Millia Islamia University and Aligarh Muslim University on Monday.
Hundreds of people gathered at Bengaluru’s Town Hall on Monday to show their support to the students of Jamia Millia Islamia University and Aligarh Muslim University, who were injured during police action at Sunday’s protests. Bengaluru activists and citizens, along with the All India Democratic Students Organisation (AIDSO) organised a protest against Sunday’s incident in Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, as well as against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA). At 4 pm, when the protest was scheduled to begin, there were police barricades put up in front of the Town Hall to dissuade people from standing there to hold their protest. There was also a SWAT vehicle, a water canon vehicle, with several police cars and buses were standing by. Tanveer Ahmed, the inspector of the SJP police station, told reporters gathered there that 7,000 people showed up for the protest held on Sunday, while organisers had asked for permission for only three hundred people. This caused inconvenience to the public as well as created problems for the police to maintain law and order. Read: Bengaluru citizens protest at Town Hall against Citizenship Act Citing this, the inspector along with other police officers began shooing away protesters. A small group of protesters and the police got agitated, and the discussion got heated about the protest being called off. Three to five people were taken away by the police to the nearest police station. The police alleged to reporters that one of the protesters had been extremely disrespectful, and this is why they were taken away in a police vehicle to SJP Police station. Vishesh Guru, a student organiser, told the inspector that he had already given an intimation letter to the Commissioner of Police, and this letter was sealed by that office. However, the police did not accept and asked Vishesh to approach the DCP for permission. By that time, several protesters had arrived at the venue, and the numbers began to swell. They then decided to begin protesting without the additional permission. Hundreds attended the protest on Sunday, with many shouting the Preamble of the Constitution in turns, and pledged to defend the Constitution. They then sat down on the road before the barricades to shout slogans against the Narendra Modi government and Amit Shah. They shouted slogans demanding freedom from the NRC, from the CAA, and condemned the Delhi police’s action against the protesters. The protestors also sang the national anthem when the protest was being wrapped up. The JD(S) MLA candidate from Shivajinagar, Tanveer Ahmed was also at the protest, along with Asif, who is a former TV channel host. Mohammad Shouaib, an LLB student from Al-Ameen college, said that many of the student protesters were upset that the protest being hijacked by politicians. “The protest was organized by students, for the students. Nobody knows who invited them (politicians), they just showed up and took over the sloganeering and the protests.” Shouaib added. The Bengaluru police allowed the protest to go on for an hour, after the police were assured that the protest would go on peacefully. Speaking to TNM after he was released, Nagakarthik, one of those who were picked up by the police, said that they were not charged, and the police allowed them to go home after two hours, after the protesters were dispersed. The person who had an altercation with the police told TNM that the inspector had pulled him up for taking a picture of the police vehicles, and for not revealing his name to the police. Videos from Sunday show the police opening fire on protesters, and several videos show the police resorting to lathi charge and teargas, allegedly because students were throwing stones. According to news reports, several journalists were also injured by the police while they were doing their duty of covering the incidents. The Jamia vice-chancellor has demanded a high-level enquiry as to why the police entered the college campus without permission. Read: Police entered campus without permission, we want high-level probe: Jamia VC Protests erupted across the country in several different cities against the CAA, with Bengaluru itself having a massive protest attended by thousands of people.
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