Ashish on BBC

How constraints are good for you

On Sunday met up with Rekhi's in Freedom Park, a beautiful newly constructed garden out of the the old Bangalore Jail . To just show him the way back home, I escorted him part of the way to Cubbon Park. On the way back, we crossed Vidhana Soudha and took a U turn for going to Cubbon Park. Turns out that U turn was prohibited at that spot.

Well it was a Sunday evening light traffic and no harm done to any body , I took the forbidden U turn. Now Rekhi is a very rule bound person and would not violate any law, however probably he has decided to relax a little and followed me and took the U.  As luck would have it, there was a police constable who flagged both our vehichles down.

He asked us for our D/L and saw that my D/L was prepared in Chennai, Rekhi's was probably made in  Delhi and the constable asked if we were out of station and I said I was from Delhi and so was Rekhi.

I was prepared to pay a fine of Rs. 100/- or so but the constable started talking about a Rs. 500/- buck fine. If I had been on my own, it wouldn't have mattered, but getting a friend to waste money on a traffic fine because of my fault was very embarrassing. Left to myself, I would have bribed the guy 100 or 200 Rs. and gone my way but with Rekhi there, bribing was just out of the question . So both of us would pay the fine, whatever the amount.

So any way I got talking to him and said I was a consultant to the State Government and this sign prohibiting no-entry was not there earlier. Also I just casually mentioned names of a few Senior police officers who I knew, merely with the intention of paying a reasonable fine Rs. 100/-, 200/- or so and not Rs. 500/-. Obviously asking a senior police official to intervene to avoid even a cumulative Rs. 1000/- fine was also out of the question.

Well at some point of my talking , the constable said OK, don't bother, don't do it the next time and he sent us on our way without any fine. I  was so relieved; No more violating any traffic rules , ( except for parking under no parking signs, we will take some chances ) though the city gives you many opportunities for the same.

A picture of the beautiful freedom park 

Some bloggers who have done a good job of describing freedom park
http://www.bangalorebeats.com/bangaloreblog/index.php/freedom-park-bangalore/

http://www.mybangalore.com/article/freedom-park-in-bangalore.html

Freedom park is designed by a young Architect couple, Mathew and Ghosh, who were selected through a competition.

Friends from Kuppam

For the record I worked from 2003 May to September 2005 in the Kuppam HP i-community Project. The project employed many young people who belonged to Kuppam to work in the various projects of Kuppam. Even after the closure of the project many them kept in touch with me. I followed their careers over the past 4 years and I am impressed  by the success all of them have achieved.

Of the Kuppam Young brigade one of the most noteworthy has been Venkatachalapathi. Venkatachalapathi started his career in Bangalore selling Reliance post paid connections door to door to shop keepers in Bangalore. Soon he got a job with the HP service centre in Indra Nagar. His next job was with a partner to Wipro and he was responsible for tech support to one of Wipro's customers. Now he works directly with HP and manages MS Exchange Server for one of HP's overseas customers. 

Some of the others like Amar and Karuna whose photographs are included in the blog have also done well.

Amar was passionate about computers and after BASIX took over the Kuppam project, he was given the responsibility of supporting the entire IT equipment comprising of Computers, Servers, Wifi radio equipment of the Project. Amar now works for a BPO initiative of BASIX a leading microfinance organisation

Karuna after the closure of the project moved to n-Logue and thereafter to COMAT. In COMAT he was part of the team that established the  Nemmadi Project( setting up of 800 telecentres in Karnataka).

While it is a sad commentary that the Kuppam HP i-community initiative was not sustainable, it made a positive impact on the young people who were employed in the program and later moved on to better things in life

These photographs were taken on August 30th 2008. . The photograph on the top is of the Neelamma the Village Photographer. The photo below Neelamma is of Karuna and his bride lavanya . Karuna got married on 20th August. The photo in the bottom is of Amar and his wife Krishnaveni, Amar and Krishnaveni got married in February . 

For more information on Kuppam Kuppam Factoids

For information on the Kuppam HP i-community program Kuppam HP i-community