Monkey menace in Kengeri

Monkeys are the latest entrants to Kengeri. Once occasional guests to the coconut groves on the periphery of the town, have come to call Kengeri their permanent home. Residents are fedup with these jumping jacks creating chaos wherever they choose to go.They are not afraid of people anymore.They are asserting their rights on the town.

Repeated complaints to BBMP has been of no use, as BBMP merely says it has forwarded the complaint to the Forest department. Recently, there was a news article where the Forest department instead of finding a solution to this menace , has come out with a set of guidelines to coexist with these chaotic creatures. These are not our friendly street dogs that you can coexist with them.

People cannot even take the problem into their own hands, as it was reported recently. One of the Apartments near Sarjapur Road was so tired of the monkey menace, that it decided to take the matter into its own hands. They got a monkey catcher to trap all of them and as they were preparing to transport these monkeys into the forest, the forest department accompanied by police came out of the blue  and arrested the president of the Apartment Owners Association.

Gutte Anjaneyaswamy , Help Us!!! 

Real Estate in Kengeri : Part 3

Update on my previous posts : http://kengeri.blogspot.com/2009/05/real-estate-in-kengeri-part-2.html The Land shark who had illegally occupied the layout has lost his case in High Court against the site owners . But, as per sources, he intends to take up the case with the Supreme Court. Truth has finally triumphed against evil, a little late though. I cannot understand what he gained from all of this GoondaRaj !! Hope God gives him some sadbudhi !!

Have you talked to your Corporator ?

Have you ever tried to contact your ward Corporator. I did for the first time 2 years ago, to report to her on the Garbage problem in our street. It never occured to me that there is someone called a corporator that i have voted and is there to look after my problems.

I belong to the Hemmigepura ward whose corporator is Mrs.Veena Nagaraj (The ward being reserved for Women). I was very happy during BBMP elections, that our ward would be represented by Woman. I enthusiastically voted for Veena Nagaraj who belongs to BJP, the party which had a pretty good reputation back in those days.

So, when the time came to talk to my elected representative, i was in for a shock. This is what happened when i called up the corporator on the mobile number , which was displayed on the BBMP website :

A guy picked the call .I said -" Can i speak to Veena Nagaraj ? "

"Tell me.You can talk to me ". But, i insisted on talking to the corporator.But the guy did not give up.
"Whats your problem sir.Tell me "

"There is uncleared garbage in our street corner for the past so many months.No one has even bothered to clear it,despite repeated complaints to BBMP. The garbage is attracting lots of mosquitos,rats ,Dogs and even monkeys.Please do something "

"Dont worry sir.Definitely i will get it done for you"

2 Weeks passed ,but nothing happened on the ground.Just a false assurance. Later, i somehow contacted the Corporator of the neighbouring Kengeri Ward, Mr.Anjanappa. The matter was solved the very next day, even though it was not his ward.

This is what is the least expected out of a Corporator , responding to people's problems. The problems are  very simple like uncleared garbage, untarred roads,water problems. They are not complex issues that requires you to bang your head against the wall.

 If as a corporator, you cannot respond to simple issues in your ward, why the hell should we call you as our elected representative ?

If women's reservation creates proxies like this, then what's the whole point about women's reservation ?

How do you expect me to vote for you the next time, if this is the way you are ?

Traffic in Uttarahalli Road

With the asphalting of the Uttarahalli road, more and more people have started using the road.Be it Jayanagar, Konanakunte cross,Bannerghatta road,Devegowda petrol Bunk and even Electronic City, people want to use this road.

Even a year back, only a handfull of people knew about this strech of road.The condition of the raod was pathetic.It was considered very dangerous to travel on this road after 7 O Clock in the night, as there were many instances of bikers being attacked and looted on certain lonely streches of this road.But now all that is history.

The road is really good now with lenty of street lights and new localities coming up along side the Road.Lot of techies from the Global village campus take this road to raech their destinations.Many of the comapny buses like wipro,infosys take this route to Electronic city.Students of engineering colleges like SJBIT,JSS,Global,etc also take this route.

The only complain about this road is its too narrow.One heavy truck/Bus can completely block the traffic from behind, often forcing them to follow their pace.Surevey has also been done by PWD to widen the road from kengeri to Channsandra(RR nagar).But, god only knows when the PWD would start with its exercise...

BMTC Volvo Buses finally find their way to KST

BMTC has finally intoduced the Volvo Bus services from KST. These vayu vajra buses bearing route 375A will start from Shirke in KST and will reach Electronic city wading through the uttarahalli Road.

Its really nice to see these high tech buses making their way through Kengeri and KST.It will definitely benefit the Techies staying in KST and surrounding areas, who travel to their work place in Electronic city and the surrounding areas. This service will also help people who stay in areas like Uttarahalli,R.R nagar and other areas that adjacent to the Uttrahalli road to reach their work place.

The buses are not that crowded as of now.But , have to wait and watch .It takes time for people to get to know of the new service.

Land Sharks in Kengeri : Part 1

How would you feel , if one fine morning you come for a normal stroll around your site , only to find that it has been fenced and occupied by some stranger ?
Thats what happened exactly with us. One sunday morning we came to realise that our site on vidyapeetha road in Kengeri has been illegally occupied by some one. Our site was a part of a layout that was primarily made and owned by the Bank and working professionals.The whole layout was fenced and cordonned off like a war zone.The road leading to the layout was also blocked.Some Goons had also been placed at the layout to shoo away the actual owners and their sympathisers.

In utter Shock and disbelief, we told the goons stationed there with a lump in the throat that the land belonged to us and questioned their authority to not only tresspass but occupy the piece of land illegally. We were told that the land belonged to Mr.M, a realtor and a small time politician in kengeri and he had inherited the whole piece of land from his grandfather. The layout was formed by purchasing the land from this person's grandfather.In fact this person had given his consent and signed on the agreement paper. Now, his version was that his consent was not taken while selling the land and so the "Pahni " still had his grandfather's name.So, he was the rightfull owner of this piece of land.
Where was he all these years and why did he raise his ugly head only now ?
This was the big question that haunted all the site owners in the layout. This person M being a localite knew everthing about this layout formation, people who purchased the sites and evrything.People had put up fences, some of them had even put up foundations to build small houses.He never had any objection to all this.But , it was only now that he realised that this piece of land belonged to him (According to his version of the story). One of the major reasons for his great awakening was the spiralling Land prices in Kengeri and the seemingly timid and gullible educated people who he thought would not even dare to provide mild resistance to his cunning move. So, he made this plan of occupying this piece of land and planned to sell it to some high profile real estate developers in the city. Who would get such a large chunk of land , especially inside Kengeri and almost for free.This was a perfect plan to make some quick money using dirty tricks.

To be Continued...

Real Estate in Kengeri : Part 2

Continuing from my previous post, Lets talk about the powerful Land mafia thats raising its ugly head in and around Kengeri-KST.

With large tracts of agricultural lands being converted into Residential Layouts with many being legal and even more illegally, many people fell into a trap.Many people in the run to turn their dream of owning a site in Bangalore , bought sites in the many illegal layouts, turning a blind eye to the legal formalities and requirements.For years they had no problem at all.They were given water and electricity connection by the Town Municipal corporatio of Kengeri.Many paid the taxes promptly, thinking that they would get futher benifits from the municipality and lead a peacefull life, only to be shattered later.

With the land prices spiralling in Bangalore and increasing real estate activity in and around Kengeri, the real estate mafias started finding new ways to cash in on the situation, even if it meant riding the dark horse.These land mafias turned their eyes on the many illegal layouts formed in the agricultural lands.Most of these layouts were formed without conversion from agricultural use and without any layout plan approval.Many of the sites in these layouts do not have khatas in their owners name, as these are illegal layouts.So, the khatas were in the names of people who previously owned this piece of land.The land mafias cashed in on this loophole to make some quick bucks.

In one of the layouts formed in the interior of kengeri, in vidyapeetha road consists of around 30 sites, most of which were purchased by government employees and educated people.It was just an investment for them.So most of them did not bother to fence their sites or put up a small shed to show that they were in posession of the property.Most of them visted their property once or twice a year, as they were not aware of the tricks of these land mafias.Most of them had paid taxes to the municipality and some of them had khatas in their names.

One fine morning all of them came into a big shock, when they found that all the marking stones and the fences were bulldozed by some one and a huge fence covering the entire layout was put up.A shed had also come up in the layout with some goons being stationed there in case required.On enquiring about the thing , the site owners were told by the goons stationed there , that the land belonged to one person by name Anjaneya(Name changed.a local land shark) and the khatha still beared the name of his grandfather.So, being the legal heir , the entire land belonged to him.

The site owners found it really difficult to come to terms with the harsh reality.They felt helpless in front of the goondas who were hired for the purpose.After hectic phone calls , conversations and consultations, all of them decided to lodge a police complaint in the local police station.They were in for a even bigger shock, when they went to the station.

What was the big shock that was waiting for them in the Police station ? What happened to their sites?

To get get answers to these questions and many more, read my futher posts in this series...