Talk about globalisation…
I’ve been in Bangalore for a little over a year now. Many of my friends had greeted me for having landed a job in the Silicon Valley of India. My brothers-in-law had given me gyaan on how to keep switching jobs until I landed a lucrative one and how it is a nice place to do so. To say the least, Bangalore is the most disappointing city ever. It’s overly hyped. It’s all talk and no walk. It’s emotionally a very wrung-out city. One would hardly call it a city looking at the infra-structure. But what is more disturbing, is something that has started recently.
A section of Kannadigas is against the city being so outsider-friendly and is demanding a change. “Bangalore hardly looks like a Kannada city. We want our city back.”, says the Karunada Sene, a jingoistic pro-Kannada group.
It is not uncommon to see hoardings displaying products manufactured by MNC’s, blackened out. There were violent protests and mass vandalism when theatre owners didn’t follow the moratorium sought by the Kannada film industry. The Karunada Sene has big plans for the ‘We want Bangalore back’ movement. Their demands are simple (yeah, right):
Locals should be given preference in jobs
Kannada should be spoken in public places
Hoardings should be in Kannada
Kannada should be made compulsory in school
Roads should have Kannada names
Out of these only the one about Kannada being made compulsory in schools sounds cogent.
A retired central government official recently sought help for his educated, unemployed, 27-year-old son at a counselling centre. His son had been participating in an anti-outsider demonstration and was arrested by the cops according to the director of the counselling centre. His frustration was obvious. Outsiders hogging all the attention. MNCs not beign fair to local kids and not offering them the lion’s share of the job pool. Not only that. They have a problem with non-Kannadas dominating Bangalore’s economic and cultural life. Azim Premji and Kiran Mazumdar Shaw being the richest business people in the city is a matter of concern for them.
My only intention behind this post was to warn people of an impending threat. To uncover Bangalore’s true image to most people who have a highly roseate picture of this city. It may have been a peach a few years back, but it’s no longer so. It’s a very expensive city with very little to offer in the form of housing facilities and public infrastructure. Transportation is darned expensive and the traffic police make life a living hell for the outsiders. Accidents are commonplace due to bad roads and even more non-sensical drivers who mistake city roads for drag racing strips. It is highly unsafe after 10 pm, which is pretty much a safe time in most major cities.
I don’t see any reason why any person in his right mind should not stay away from this place.
