Mumbai, Nov 6:

The Kannada Seva Sangha Powai Association which served the society for more than one-and-a-half decade opened its own office at Solaris building, opposite of LMDT gate no 6 in the metropolitan city, here.

CA Shankar B Shetty president of Bunts association Mumbai inaugurated the new premises; Dharmadarshi Shree Suvarna Baba of Shree Rundamalini Panchakutira Suvarna temple blessed the gathering.

Jerimeri, Shree Umamaheshwari temple priest Vidwan S N Udupa performed the religious rituals. D K Shetty couple took part in rituals.

Shekar Ajekar, one of the association founders, former regional former social worker, MNS party leader Sharadh S Pawar, vice presidents of association Keshav N Anchan and Ramesh D Rai, honorary chief secretary Dayanandha C Bangera, honorary treasurer Harish S Shetty, building association chief convener Justice R J Shetty, convener Mahesh S Shetty, secretary of advising  committee Prabakar S Shetty, welcome committee secretary Diwakar M Shetty, education committee working  president Nagaraj Gurupur,  social development committee working president Karunkar J Shetty, Ramesh Rai, womens wing working president Jyothi R Shetty, youth division working president Sandesh Shetty Mudbelle, sports committee working president Ajith Shetty Belman, cultural committee working president Prashanthi D Shetty, membership committee working president Sadhu Poojary, Tulu committee working president Jaganath Shetty Yenneholle and all other members and representatives were present during the occasion .

source: http://www.DaijiWorld.com / Home> News> Mumbai / by Rons Bantwal / Daijiworld Media Network – Mumbai (DV) / Tuesday, November 06th, 2012

CD review

Bangalore was once a proud home to a thriving jazz culture, thanks to the wonderful Anglo-Indian and Parsee communities that contributed immensely to the city’s artistic landscape.

Over the decades, as their numbers dwindled, a lot of that sub-culture gradually began vanishing from public spaces. Some shut for good and others faded out of popular memory. A few precious families remain and continue to keep the jazz sub-culture alive in fragments. ‘UNK – The Radha Thomas Ensemble – I Only Have Eyes for you’ has been created by a band of musicians who have experienced the fine flavours of the past and seem to make a genuine attempt to deliver a part of it to the coming generations of jazz enthusiasts. UNK, you realise, is a distortion for the word aankh, meaning the eye. The cover of the CD has a cornea in the middle of a peacock feather, just in case you miss it.

In the eight tracks on this CD, what comes across are a few things worth noticing. The first is the voice of Radha Thomas, whose voice modulation is excellent inspite of her trying desperately hard to sound dusky. A bit of monotony sets in after the first couple of tracks. If such a forced effort could be avoided, Radha could certainly be one of the finest jazz voices in Bangalore. For someone like Radha, who has had the good fortune of taking professional training in a genre as complicated as Dhrupad, this shouldn’t be much.

Her voice modulation, that can be heard in little phrases and delicate interludes, makes for pleasurable listening. The next is the brilliant idea of collaborating with various artistes to bring in this collection. Radha’s voice isn’t present in half the tracks on the CD and she generously makes space for others to improvise on their own music. The main five-minute track after which this album takes its name, I only have eyes for you by Harry warren and Al Dubin, could have been infused with a bit more life. A pleasant element is the piano performed in the third track Connections and fifth track Refuge by Aman Mahajan. He is certainly someone to look out for on the Indian music scene in the coming years.

Watermelon Man, the classic by Harbie Hancock, comes across as another pleasant surprise with wonderful improvisation done with the layering technique. A soothing chorus comes in as you are ready to tap your feet to this track. Matt Littlewood’s saxophone and Ramjee Chandran’s guitar could have been extended a bit more than what is there.

This CD makes for a sweet gift this festive season, from the heart of real Bangalore’s jazz scene.

source: http://www.DeccanHerald.com / Home> Supplements> Sunday Herald Arts & Culture> by Veejay Sai / November 04th, 2012

Faisal poses with a bicycle at a docking station at the MG Road Metro

The three young minds behind Bengaluru’s first completely automated bicycle sharing platform have been kept on their toes over the last few days.

Understandably too, as registrations have been on full-swing ever since the ATCAG (Automated Tracking and Control of Green Assets) metro docking stations opened to the public on Tuesday. Srinivas Ramesh, Syed Haseeb Arfath and Srinidhi Sridhar-the cofounders of Kerberon Automations, talk to us about this project, which has finally taken off in a big way, even as they insist that cycling is making some serious inroads into the lifestyles of young, urban Bengaluru.

“We now have docking stations in MG Road, Trinity and Ulsoor. In the next one week, we’ll also launch the ones in Indiranagar, Baiyapanahalli and SV Road, with a capacity of 100 cycles,“ starts off Srinivas. The idea for the venture itself was Arfath’s final year college project. “At that time, there was a lot of illegal parking collection going on and I wanted to introduce an automated system that would scan vehicles and allocate parking space accordingly.

When I showed this to my professor, he liked the idea but asked me to replace cars with cycles. Once, I was done with college, I took it forward.”

Talking about how cycling is set to become an integral part of urban Bengaluru’s life, Srinivas says, “Over the past year, the bicycle sharing system has been used by people right from the age of 18 to 63 years, by tourists, head chefs, CEOs, IT professionals. The cycleto-work trend is catching on -it’s seen as cool. Our aim is to promote non-motorised transport. Bengaluru is such a beautiful city with amazing weather.

And people are opening up to the idea of cycling. These days, at any given traffic signal, you’re bound to find at least one fully-kitted cyclist with a laptop bag, on his way to work. Bengaluru used to lack proper cycling infrastructure, but the BBMP recently launched a 42-kilometre cycling lane in Jayanagar.“ Srinidhi, adds, “Queries have been pouring in and we’re seeing people across segments, but mainly office-goers.”

So, do these young businessmen cycle to work themselves? Srinivas smiles, “I do about 30 km on a daily basis, and over the weekends, I try to cover over 100 km,“ while Srinidhi shrugs, “I cycle whenever possible. Since I take care of the technology, I often have a lot of heavy stuff to lug around. But when it’s office and back, I use a cycle.”

This young venture is a product of friendship. “Srinidhi and I had been studying together since LKG and are neighbours,“ says Arfath, “When I started Kerberon, he was contemplating going to the US, but I convinced him to stay back and join me. We weren’t very close before, but now, I spend most of my time with him.“ And what do they do to relax after a hard day’s work? He replies, “There is not much time to relax. But, Srinivas does regular trips to Nandi Hills and has introduced it to us too.”

As for their plans for the future, Arfath reveals, “Three months back, we launched an electric scooter version in a biotech park in Hyderabad. We want to introduce other non-motorised, clean modes of transport. So, the next step will be looking at electric cars.“ Srinivas concludes, “Kerberon will soon be in all the metros. We’re in talks already and everyone seems to be open to the idea.”

source: http://www.DeccanChronicle.com / Home> Tabloid> Bengaluru / by Anusha Vincent, DC / November 01st, 2012