Monthly Archives: November 2017

Date with history: ET explains the story behind the names – The plague that helped Bengaluru expand

About Bangalore(Bengaluru) / Karnataka, Records, All, World Opinion
"Some people refused to go to plague camps because they would then have to mingle with other castes," said Meera Iyer, co-convenor, Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH). (Image source:Wikipedia)
“Some people refused to go to plague camps because they would then have to mingle with other castes,” said Meera Iyer, co-convenor, Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH). (Image source:Wikipedia)

In a way, Bengaluru owes its expansion to the plague. It was the outbreak in the late 1800s that egged people -until then averse to relocation -to settle in newly-created extensions like Basavanagudi and Malleswaram. A famous incident involving trader-philanthropist BP Annaswamy Mudaliar took place at a plague inoculation camp in the city . The crowd at the camp was leery about inoculations when Mudaliar, a progressive thinker, lectured them about the benefits, folded his sleeve  and got himself vaccinated. While this crowd cooperated with the administration’s efforts to curtail the disease, widespread public resistance towards certain control measures culminated in what came to be known as the plague riots. The violence was also a mirror to the caste and cultural identity conflicts prevalent among people .

“Some people refused to go to plague camps because they would then have to mingle with other castes,” said Meera Iyer, co-convenor, Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH), explaining that people hid in relatives’ or neighbours’ houses to avoid being forcefully segregated. Apparently , dead bodies were simply abandoned. “Caste was a big factor that hindered plague prevention and treatment. There was also strong opposition to bodies being examined for plague because the last  rites would be delayed.

 In their book Health and Medicine in the Indian Princely States: 1850-1950, Waltraud Ernst, Biswamoy Patil and TV Sekher state how hospitals were looked upon as jails and slaughterhouses, and how people stopped using public water taps because they believed that the purified drinking water supplied to them would actually poison them. “As an expression of hostility towards administrative measures to curtail the plague, the public set fire to plague sheds. The Health Officer of Bangalore City ,  Achyut Rao, had stones thrown at him by youth who disapproved of inoculation,” according to the book.

The culmination of these events came to be known as the ‘Ganjam Riots’ (Ganjam is near Srirangapatna). It started with two weavers from Bengaluru dying of the plague within a week of their arrival in Ganjam on November 02, 1898. Locals refused to cremate the second body , stating that the victim was poisoned.People threw stones at officers. The police, with full emergency powers, raided the village and arrested 55 people for the violence.Villagers retaliated with sticks, swords and guns. The police opened fire to control the mob, resulting in death and injuries.

 M Jamuna, professor, department of history , Bangalore University, said that this crisis of confidence compelled the administration to focus on sanitation measures instead. “Between 1900-01, 13,223 homes were disinfected with chemicals while 47,801 were disinfected by exposure to sun, air and whitewash. In Bengaluru, 71 homes were demolished. The administration planned to remove congestion and improve drainage systems. Budget provisions were made for plague-relief and surplus revenue was also  also spent for the cause.” This resulted in restoration of public confidence and greater co-operation with authorities.

source: http://www.economictimes.indiatimes.com / The Economic Times / Home> News> Politics and Nation / by Divya Shekhar, ET Bureau / November 02nd, 2017

Women police elated at breaking glass ceiling

Records, All

Neelamani N. Raju is appointed as the first woman Director-General and Inspector-General of Police of the State.

Several IPS officers are elated with the appointment of Neelamani N. Raju as the first woman Director-General and Inspector-General of Police (DG & IGP) of the State.

That no woman had occupied the top post in Karnataka so far was a reminder of the glass ceiling in a predominantly male force that has in recent times seen several women IPS officers excel.

Senior IPS officer Malini Krishnamoorthy, who is posted as Additional Commissioner of Police (Law and Order, West) Bengaluru, said the appointment was extremely significant and a signal in the right direction. “Ms. Raju is the senior-most officer in the State and there is no reason why she shouldn’t be given the top post,” she said, and added that this would go a long way in increasing the confidence of all policewomen. “This is a time that we should use to better leverage women police personnel across the State,” she said.

D. Roopa, another IPS officer, said all policewomen in the State were congratulating themselves. “It was high time we had a woman chief and we have got one,” she said.

Historically, the only other woman officer who has come close to occupying the position but was denied was Jija Harisingh, a 1975 batch officer and also the first woman IPS officer of Karnataka cadre. Ms. Harisingh was in the race for the posts of the Police Commissioner of Bangalore in 2006 and DG & IGP in 2009. At that time, she had expressed her unhappiness at the top posts being denied to her. Ms. Harisingh, who retired in 2011, was not available for comment.

The second IPS officer from the State, Prabha H. Rao — a 1982 batch officer — was later absorbed into the Central Intelligence Agency and is still posted there.

Ms. Raju, the third IPS officer from the Karnataka cadre, has had a 23-year-long tenure in the Intelligence Bureau and returned to State service in 2016.

Chief Secretary

In all likelihood, a woman will be in the running for the post of Chief Secretary. The incumbent chief secretary Subhash Chandra Khuntia, a 1981 batch IAS officer, will retire on November 30. The next line of seniority has two women officers, followed by another male officer. The senior most IAS officer is Ratna Prabha K who is also a 1981 batch IAS officer and will retire on March 31, 2018. Two others in the race are 1982 batch officers Latha Krishna Rao G. and S.K. Pattanayak, both on central deputation presently.

However, it will not be the first time the State will have a woman Chief Secretary.

Sources in the government, however, said that no call had been taken on the issue, and that the Chief Minister was likely to go by seniority.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> States> Karnataka / by Staff Reporter / Bengaluru – October 31st, 2017

Rajayotsava : The Hows and Whys of Karnataka

About Bangalore(Bengaluru) / Karnataka, Arts, Culture & Entertainment, Records, All

RajayotsavaBF01nov2017

Today is Karnataka Rajyotsava, a day celebrating the formation of the state in 1956. ‘One State, Many Worlds’ best describes our story, marked by a unification despite the pulls and pressures of socio-linguistic fragmentation

There is not a day on which Kannada, the state language of Karnataka, comes into popular focus more than every November 1. The day marked as Karnataka Rajyotsava, a public holiday, has been typically accompanied by visual symbols everywhere, of the state’s identity – like buntings of an (unofficial) flag and banners about an (official) language.

Translated literally to ‘State Festival’, Rajyotsava marks the day in 1956 when the erstwhile Mysore State was expanded to re-unify into it, some key Kannada-speaking and geographically connected regions of South India. The change of the State’s official name to Karnataka itself happened close to two decades later, with the passing of the Mysore State (Alteration of Name) Act, 1973.

The early C(K)arnatic

The term ‘re-unification’ of the State needs to be understood with some historical context. The geo-political expansion of the region had been commenced by Chikka Devaraka Wodeyar and continued by Hyder Ali, which towards the end encompassed a surprising area compared to what Karnataka State is today.

This growth of the Mysorean region was of course cut short by two key events: The Treaty of Seringapatam (1792) which ended the Third Anglo-Mysore War, and The Siege of Seringapatam (1799) which ended the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War.

The result of the former was that, about half of the Mysorean territory, was divided by the British and their allies at the time – the Mahratta Peshwa acquired territories up to the Tungabhadra River, and the Nizam of Hyderabad was granted land between the Krishna and Pennar Rivers, and the forts of Cuddapah and Gandikota. The East India Company itself retained a large integral central portion (Mysore and Coorg) and some of the Malabar Coast territories between Travancore and the Kali River, as also Baramahal and Dindigul districts. The result of the latter, which marked the final confrontation between the East India Company and the Kingdom of Mysore, was a further division of the remaining parts of the kingdom – Kanara, Wyanad, Coimbatore, Dharmapuri and Srirangapatna were retained by the British and the Nizam acquired Gooty, a part of Chittoor and Chitradurga districts. The effect on the ground was that large pockets of people were placed outside the core Mysore region, but still retained Kannada as lingua franca because of continued trade and commerce across the borders of a larger core region.

Karnataka in focus

The implication of the States Reorganisation Act of 1956 for the Kannada speaking regions at that time was of course, the re-unification of some zones that had been separated over a hundred years earlier, and the merger of other zones that were inherently Kannada speaking but were part of historical empires that had held on to them over time.

Remarkably, the name indicated by the States Reorganisation Committee for the unified state was “Karnataka”. The committee’s report provides explanatory notes
as to why the state was not proposed to be divided into two (keeping the erstwhile Mysore State separate, as was demanded by a school of thought at that time), and Section 329, which clearly states, “For these reasons, we recommend that one Karnataka State should be formed. This state should, in our opinion, comprise the, following areas…” and lists the areas proposed for unification covering the then existing Mysore State, four Kannada-speaking districts of the southern division of Bombay, namely, Belgaum, Bijapur, Dharwar and North Kanara, two districts from the princely state of Hyderabad namely Raichur and Gulbarga, South Kanara, Kollegal from Madras, and Coorg.

There were some exclusions in the recommendations, such as Bellary and Hospet taluks, as well as Kasargod, and further explanations were provided with a note “The territorial limits of Karnataka, as thus proposed, broadly cover the Kannada-speaking areas, but in the case of one or two small units, linguistic considerations have been subordinated to other compelling reasons”. The report also mentions Kolar district as an inclusion despite having a majority of Telugu speakers, for reasons of historical interest of Mysore in its industry as well as proximity to Bangalore versus Kurnool or Hyderabad. It also provides a list of over a dozen additional justifications for inclusions, exclusions, economic considerations, developmental and industrial issues, natural resources, population and administration. Finally, in Section 351, the report makes a defining statement: “Karnataka with the territorial limits which have been indicated so far will have linguistic and cultural homogeneity and geographical integrity. Barring a few dissentients, all those who have been concerned with the Karnataka problem in some form or (Aber will sooner or later recognise that this is so…”

Despite the recommended name in the SRC Report, the name of the expanded State was retained as Mysore in the SRA of 1956. Two decades later, with the passing of the Mysore State (Alteration of Name) Act, 1973, the erstwhile Mysore State officially adopted the name of Karnataka. This was in itself also due to an identity conflict where residents of northern Karnataka felt the name of Mysore reflected only the erstwhile regime, and did not represent the expanded state. Prior to the unification of Gulbarga, Raichur, Bidar and Koppal districts, the High Court jurisdiction was Hyderabad, only 200 km away, but after the unification it had moved to Bangalore, at four times the distance.

(The author is an IT professional and Bengaluru heritage enthusiast)

source: http://www.bangaloremirror.indiatimes.com / Bangalore Mirror / Home> Bangalore> Others / by Kiran Natarajan / Bangalore Mirror Bureau / November 01st, 2017