Kolkata News

[studdmanster]

cc: The Telegraph

The Union culture ministry is ready to give Rabindra Sadan a facelift, but there are no takers for the job.

The ministry, which is inviting proposals for a large-scope, long-term Tagore project to commemorate the writer’s 150th birth anniversary, is keen to restore and expand halls and auditoriums named after Tagore in the country under the project.

Apart from Rabindra Sadan, there is Rabindra Kalakshetra in Bangalore, Rabindra Bhavan in Delhi and Ravindra Natya Mandir in Mumbai. The restoration will be dealt with directly by the ministry.

“Most of these came up during the Tagore centenary. Different state governments, societies and private organisations built them with 50-70 per cent financial assistance from the Centre,” says Union culture secretary Jawhar Sircar, who was in town on Saturday.

“By providing affordable performance spaces the auditoriums contributed to the cultural activity of the time. Over the years most of these halls have become dated,” Sircar adds.

The ministry is offering to assist a complete overhaul with state-of-the-art technology and to share the costs with the state or other agencies. “Instead of keeping them as standalone auditoriums we will urge their development into complexes or Tagore Parisars, so that these become good places to visit with coffee shops and outdoor performance areas.”

Six proposals are in. Mumbai wants to revamp its Tagore theatre and Tripura, though its Rabindra Bhavan is new, wants to redo it.

“We haven’t had any proposals from the state for Rabindra Sadan but Visva-Bharati, which is yet to have an auditorium named after Tagore, has applied for assistance,” says Sircar.

Before major changes are made, the ministry will conduct a design competition so that the architectural renovation for each hall is aesthetic.

Architectural renovation is only a part of the project, which emphasises a new look at Tagore’s works.

Tagore would be interpreted, adapted and translated in all the other 21 Indian languages, but in such a way as to make the works accessible at different levels. So even if there is no one to translate Shesher Kabita into Tulu word for word, the ministry could perhaps come up with a handy gist.

The project aims to explore Tagore’s pioneering contribution to subjects of contemporary relevance. “Tagore’s views on gender inequalities, caste discrimination, agricultural development, co-operative movement, rural reconstruction, village and craft enterprises, far ahead of his times, will be reanalysed in the light of present day changes,” he adds.

A proposal, for a Tagore performance or exhibition or any other interpretation of his works, can get up to Rs 5 lakh. The applicants need to come through a non-profit organisation, which can then put its proposal before a regional committee.

“The last date for submitting the applications is May 2012,” says K.K. Banerjee, the convener of the east zone regional committee on the Tagore project.

Another proposed scheme is the compilation of a complete Tagore bibliography.

Proposals on Rabindra Sadan may not have been forthcoming, but the ministry has been inundated with proposals on other subjects since the first meeting of the national committee on May 20. Some of them are rather unorthodox.

While one insists that a kidney transplantation clinic is a better way of remembering Tagore than a cultural do, another offers to “market Tagore products on Facebook and Orkut”, a third wants a grant to put Tagore on Twitter.

The regional committee in the east zone is headed by writer Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay.

[studdmanster]

cc: The Telegraph

Strap on your helmets, the Hogs are headed for Calcutta.

Harley-Davidson India plans to open its first showroom in the city next year, making the 750cc-plus heavyweights from Milwaukee in Wisconsin, US, available to enthusiasts in eastern India.

The line-up of the Hogs, as the Harleys are lovingly called in their parent country, includes the Softail Fat Boy that Arnold Schwarzenegger rode in Terminator 2.

“We have started the process of selecting a dealer. Given the usual timeline of the selection process, we hope to open the doors of our dealership in Calcutta by next year,” said Sanjay Tripathi, the marketing director of Harley-Davidson, India.

The company is banking on the “tremendous biking culture in the city where motorbike races used to be held in the 1950s and 60s in the Behala airfield”, said Tripathi. “We have received several queries from the city about the bikes. There was tremendous response when we invited applications for dealerships.”

For the Rs 6 lakh-plus bikes (the price can go up to Rs 35 lakh), Calcuttans are ready to “beg, steal and borrow”, felt Debarshi Sadhan Bose, who owns a number of vintage bikes. “There is a large fan following of Harleys in Calcutta,” he said.

Supriyo Roy, another bike enthusiast who has ridden his 350cc Bullet to Nepal and Rajasthan, is “counting days” to buy a Harley. “I have been saving for a 750cc touring bike,” said the restaurateur.

Harley-Davidson recently announced that it would assemble motorcycles for the Indian market from component kits supplied by its US plants. The assembly facility will start operating from the first half of 2011 and the company will announce a new price list in January, said Tripathi.

The company has dealerships in New Delhi, Mumbai, Chandigarh and Hyderabad. The dealership in Bangalore is scheduled to open in end-November.

The Harley dealership will be in a “prime location” and showcase the 12 models across the five Hog families.

The dealership will also be the venue of Harley Rock Riders, an annual platform that will bring together motorcycling and music.

Harley-Davidson has historically been associated with rock & roll. In its first year in India, it has organised a five-city Rock Riders tour featuring Split with guest performances by Them Clones, Thermal and a Quarter, Menwhopause, Native Tongue and Indus Creed. The concerts are being held in the four cities with dealerships and Bangalore.

[avishar]

Old Look, New Life For Metcalfe Hall

For 16 years, the city almost forgot this exquisite Raj-era building while some of the best heritage conservationists and hundreds of expert masons toiled to renovate it, bit by bit, brick by brick — exactly the way it was built 170 years ago.
Later this month, you can see Metcalfe Hall in its restored avatar.
Located at the junction of Strand Road and Hare Street, Metcalfe Hall, one of the most important heritage structures of the city, was crumbling to pieces due to decades of neglect. By the mid ’90s, it was a run-down building that still housed some central government offices. People were actually scared of entering the building because it was quite common for chunks to fall off and cause injuries.
It was destined to turn to ruins, like the Raj era warehouses on Strand Road. Finally, after much activism by some heritage conservationists, the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) agreed to take over the monument in 1994, and declared it a “protected monument of national importance”. A massive restoration and conservation effort was launched. It was to be more complex and time-consuming than anyone expected.
“It took us so long to restore the building because we couldn’t apply modern construction techniques. We couldn’t use concrete to repair cracks or replace wooden beams with iron ones. Every damaged wooden beam has been replaced with a wooden one. What’s more, we had to use only lime and mortar for the repairs, which has become obsolete in construction technology today. It is difficult to even locate such workers and we had to import them from places like Murshidabad and Malda,” said superintending archaeologist of ASI, Tapan Vaidya.
Metcalfe Hall was built between 1840 and 1844, with the design clearly bearing a resemblance to the Tower of Winds, Athens. The blueprint was prepared by city magistrate C K Robinson and the building was named after Charles Metcalfe, the then Governor General of India, who had worked all his life to establish a free press.
Metcalfe Hall has gone down in history as the building that housed the Imperial Library — the country’s first public library that later evolved into the National Library and shifted to Belvedere.
The building is raised on a solid basement and 30 huge Corinthian pillars support a massive entablature. Columns and colonnades surround the whole building. The main entrance from the west, comprising a giant flight of stairs, is closed and the building is now accessed through the portico on the east.
The massive restoration job centred around repairing the ceiling and the columns. While the ceiling was heavily damaged due to cracks that had developed as a result of the degradation of the wooden rafters and beams, the tall columns had started tilting. The worst affected was the porch on the eastern side, where the
cracks had widened into deep crevices and chunks had started falling off.
The ASI got a large number of conservation architects to look at the eastern porch, who ruled that mere replacement of the rafters and beams and sealing up cracks will not help because the entire roof would collapse any day. Inspection of the beams revealed that they had become hollow and were devoid of all strength.
“We told the ASI in our report that the entire ceiling had to be brought down and the columns had to be ‘tied up’ to the ceiling if the building was to be saved. This was an extremely difficult job and thankfully the ASI was able to do it,” said Manish Chakraborty, conservation architect and heritage consultant.
The roof was actually brought down and re-constructed brick by brick. The external cracks around the building have been repaired. The walls were stripped of plaster to cure the damp and repainted.
The ASI will take up restoration job of the interiors from the next financial year. It is easy to spot the damage on the ceiling where water has been seeping for
years now. Cracks on the walls of the multiple halls on both the ground and first floors are visible even to the naked eye.
It was appalling to see that Asiatic Society, which occupies the ground floor, had used corners of the front halls to store waste. On the first floor, the ASI has cordoned off a portion of the massive dance halls and uses it as its “guest house” for visiting staff members. “We have decided to open up the partition and remove the guest house once restoration of the interiors starts because the entire length of the hall should be available for public viewing in a building of such great historical significance,” Vaidya said.

Really nice to see kolkata waking up to the task of conserving its heritage buildings.

[SamitB]

Is it under construction?
Published on Today's ET,Kolkata

[Suncity]

Originally Posted by SamitB

Is it under construction?
Published on Today's ET,Kolkata
http://lite.epaper.timesofindia.com/.../Ad0011510.png

http://www.flickr.com/photos/85296574@N00/4548866684/

[SamitB]

Originally Posted by Suncity

http://www.flickr.com/photos/85296574@N00/4548866684/

Arijit had taken the picture back in April'2010
So construction is in which phase?
Anybody/ArijitB please update.

[arijeetb]

Originally Posted by SamitB

Arijit had taken the picture back in April'2010
So construction is in which phase?
Anybody/ArijitB please update.

I would not be exaggerating if I say this is the fastest commercial construction in this region. While Godrej properties decided to put tower 2 of Godrej waterside on the slow track, they progressed with this project. L&T is the contractor

This massive structure of around 20 floors which I think is larger than Omega(BIP) aopears almost topped out

[studdmanster]

Arijeet if u visit that area lately try to post some snaps of the above mentioned project...

[SarafIndian]

The Telegraph

[niljee]

Zoo facelift by winter
KINSUK BASU

Alipore zoo has started an ambitious makeover, as part of which it will get a nature interpretation centre, a 200ft wide glass panel for the tiger enclosure, a food court and a multi-tier parking lot in the next few months.

A dilapidated structure built in the 1880s on the Alipore campus is being overhauled to set up the nature interpretation centre, which will have large touch screens and screens for audio-visual presentations.

“We want to change the image of Alipore zoo as a venue for family get-togethers and picnics in winter. The zoo would rather welcome animal lovers who want to observe wildlife in peace. Students should attend a session at the nature interpretation centre before visiting the enclosures,” said zoo director Raju Das.

The 75ft-high toughened glass panel will replace the iron mesh through which tigers are viewed now. The other side of the enclosure will continue to offer a view of the tigers in the open.

“We decided on the glass panel after consulting experts. There is no threat to security. A full-grown tiger weighing around 250kg and running at 25 miles per hour can damage the glass. So we will create a hump in the enclosure that would serve as a speed-breaker should a tiger try to run at the glass,” added Das.

Zoos in Australia and Germany and other countries use glass to showcase big cats.

Zoo insiders said two Indian companies that specialised in toughened glass had been asked to submit detailed proposals for the project. The glass panel and the other changes are expected to be in place by January, according to Das.

The food court is being constructed at the northern end of the 45-acre campus following green building norms. Once it is ready, food stalls that are spread across the premises will be removed. The move is expected to minimise littering.

Also in the offing are two aviaries, a facelift for the reptile home and a souvenir shop where a monkey enclosure now stands. Tickets — the price of each will go up from Rs 20 to Rs 30 — can soon be purchased online, said an official.

The zoo authorities have planned the parking lot on 2.5 acres beside the aquarium. “It will be built on a public-private partnership basis. An aero-bridge will link the lot with the zoo,” added the official.

[sumang007]

Green activists slam Deb on Rajarhat
17 November 2010
KOLKATA, 17 NOV: Reacting sharply on housing minister Mr Gautam Deb's comments yesterday in a Press conference, city-based environmentalists today said the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) report for the Rajarhat Township project was concocted and the EIA committee was manipulated.
They also slammed the minister who claimed that the High Court has not even once raised any objection against the project. A peoples’ green court was held on 14 March 1999 in Salt Lake that was then moderated by Dr Upen Biswas, retired additional director of CBI. Following this, Mr Subhas Dutta, green activist, had filed a PIL in the High Court against the environmental degradation of the ecologically-sensitive wetlands where the project was being executed. The High Court had instructed that the project couldn't proceed without an EIA report. The court also said that the project cannot be on the 3,075 hactare and the project area should not exceed 622 hactare.
Mr Nilotpal Dutta, secretary of Rajarhat Jami Bacchao Committee, said that the project area was divided into several parts and named Action Areas. Action area I was given clearance by the environment department on the basis of the EIA report that was influenced. Mr Subhas Dutta said that EIA committee was not qualified enough to conduct the assessment. The head of the assessment team was bribed and was soon promoted to a better position for giving a clean chit to the project. All aspects of environment were not considered in the EIA. Mr Shyamal Ghosh, secretary of Peoples Green Society, said that the project has disturbed the natural sewage and drainage flow. Dhupir Bill and Ghunir Bill have been filled up. The Nowpara Khal has been filled up to construct a road. Since the project area is situated on the Vidyadhari basin, in case of heavy rains the entire Barrackpore sub-division, Bangur, Lake Town and Even Salt Lake may be flooded. Moreover, the township is reeling under water crisis. sns

Source: The Statesman

[sumang007]

Deleted

[sumang007]

Originally Posted by sumang007

Green activists slam Deb on Rajarhat
17 November 2010
KOLKATA, 17 NOV: Reacting sharply on housing minister Mr Gautam Deb's comments yesterday in a Press conference, city-based environmentalists today said the Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) report for the Rajarhat Township project was concocted and the EIA committee was manipulated.
They also slammed the minister who claimed that the High Court has not even once raised any objection against the project. A peoples’ green court was held on 14 March 1999 in Salt Lake that was then moderated by Dr Upen Biswas, retired additional director of CBI. Following this, Mr Subhas Dutta, green activist, had filed a PIL in the High Court against the environmental degradation of the ecologically-sensitive wetlands where the project was being executed. The High Court had instructed that the project couldn't proceed without an EIA report. The court also said that the project cannot be on the 3,075 hactare and the project area should not exceed 622 hactare.
Mr Nilotpal Dutta, secretary of Rajarhat Jami Bacchao Committee, said that the project area was divided into several parts and named Action Areas. Action area I was given clearance by the environment department on the basis of the EIA report that was influenced. Mr Subhas Dutta said that EIA committee was not qualified enough to conduct the assessment. The head of the assessment team was bribed and was soon promoted to a better position for giving a clean chit to the project. All aspects of environment were not considered in the EIA. Mr Shyamal Ghosh, secretary of Peoples Green Society, said that the project has disturbed the natural sewage and drainage flow. Dhupir Bill and Ghunir Bill have been filled up. The Nowpara Khal has been filled up to construct a road. Since the project area is situated on the Vidyadhari basin, in case of heavy rains the entire Barrackpore sub-division, Bangur, Lake Town and Even Salt Lake may be flooded. Moreover, the township is reeling under water crisis. sns

Source: The Statesman

Kindly ignore the names (political leaders, etc) taken in the article above (had to reproduce it completely since it came from a news article). But it is alarming that development has not taken care of basic environment issues (especially related to wetlands). Hope things are set right through help of media/ political parties, citizens. We cannot do this to our next few generations.

[Suncity]

Originally Posted by sumang007

Kindly ignore the names (political leaders, etc) taken in the article above (had to reproduce it completely since it came from a news article). But it is alarming that development has not taken care of basic environment issues (especially related to wetlands). Hope things are set right through help of media/ political parties, citizens. We cannot do this to our next few generations.

Sometimes I have noticed that when nothing else works to stop a project (krishi jomi rokkha, political violence, etc), environment becomes the rallying cry.

Tata Nanos were supposedly not only killing the green fields of Bengal, but their running on the streets of Kolkata was going to be an environmental disaster - so the big intellectual greens claimed. Now that the plant has gone to Gujarat doesn't mean that people in Bengal will stop buying cars. Interestingly all these "greens" who were churning up these issues through the media have completely stopped giving their discourse on that issue.

Saving the environment is an important task. There is like in most cases a lot of talk, but very little action. Mostly because cheap politics has taken over.

Overpopulation is one of the biggest issues. Yet you will find many of these activists have their lips sealed firmly because the real issue will make them politically incorrect and not so popular. If they really want to stop enviromental degradation, start with teaching the people about protecting the environment and reducing the family size in future.

I do like Subhash Dutta's activism. If not for this man (he may not be publicity shy), the politicians would have run amok.

[sumang007]

Originally Posted by Suncity

Sometimes I have noticed that when nothing else works to stop a project (krishi jomi rokkha, political violence, etc), environment becomes the rallying cry.

Tata Nanos were supposedly not only killing the green fields of Bengal, but their running on the streets of Kolkata was going to be an environmental disaster - so the big intellectual greens claimed. Now that the plant has gone to Gujarat doesn't mean that people in Bengal will stop buying cars. Interestingly all these "greens" who were churning up these issues through the media have completely stopped giving their discourse on that issue.

Saving the environment is an important task. There is like in most cases a lot of talk, but very little action. Mostly because cheap politics has taken over.

Overpopulation is one of the biggest issues. Yet you will find many of these activists have their lips sealed firmly because the real issue will make them politically incorrect and not so popular. If they really want to stop enviromental degradation, start with teaching the people about protecting the environment and reducing the family size in future.

I do like Subhash Dutta's activism. If not for this man (he may not be publicity shy), the politicians would have run amok.

I like Subhash Dutta's activism. And I think Environment concerns were never factored in while making any big development. Thanks to our central environment minister, at least people in power corridors (political leaders and their associated industrial/ real estate captains)are worried (a case in point being the navi mumbai airport where the authorities are being forced to rework their plans/ or take the case of vedanta). At least in some states for some key projects people will go by rule book.

Calcutta/Kolkata has a pretty long list of such blatant violations (wont be taking names but it is easy to dig them out through a simple search on internet and the associated legal cases). I hope projects go by rule book in future or mistakes rectified through legal means in a practical way

[arijeetb]

Originally Posted by Suncity

Sometimes I have noticed that when nothing else works to stop a project (krishi jomi rokkha, political violence, etc), environment becomes the rallying cry.

Tata Nanos were supposedly not only killing the green fields of Bengal, but their running on the streets of Kolkata was going to be an environmental disaster - so the big intellectual greens claimed. Now that the plant has gone to Gujarat doesn't mean that people in Bengal will stop buying cars. Interestingly all these "greens" who were churning up these issues through the media have completely stopped giving their discourse on that issue.

Saving the environment is an important task. There is like in most cases a lot of talk, but very little action. Mostly because cheap politics has taken over.

Overpopulation is one of the biggest issues. Yet you will find many of these activists have their lips sealed firmly because the real issue will make them politically incorrect and not so popular. If they really want to stop enviromental degradation, start with teaching the people about protecting the environment and reducing the family size in future.

I do like Subhash Dutta's activism. If not for this man (he may not be publicity shy), the politicians would have run amok.

I like Subhash dutta's steely resolve! Thanks to him autos are now mostly green and several of the old buses and taxis are scrapped. Most hue and cries in the name of environment degradation due to development are cheap politics.

[Suncity]

Originally Posted by arijeetb

Most hue and cries in the name of environment degradation due to development are cheap politics.

I agree. There are many folks who now use environment as an excuse to stop industrialization and development because it is against their political ideology.

[Suncity]

FIFA grants two-star status to artificial turf of West Bengal stadium

http://www.dnaindia.com/sport/report...tadium_1468680

In a big boost to West Bengal football, FIFA has granted the highest two-star status required for international matches to the artificial turf of renovated stadium Yuba Bharati Krirangan.

"This is the highest level of award given by FIFA. This is the first artificial turf football ground in the SAARC region to have received the two-star recommended certificate," a statement by the Information and Cultural Affairs Department said.

Manufactured by Fieldturf Tarkett which also laid the artificial turf at Luzhniki Olympic Stadium in Moscow, the artificial all-weather turf was laid at an approximate cost of Rs5 crore within 97 days under a state governement project.

The turf was inaugurated on August 24 last year and three Kolkata clubs -- Mohun Bagan, East Bengal and Chirag United --shared the stadium as their home venue in the last I-League season.

East Bengal also played its home AFC Cup at the same venue while currently the stadium is being used for the Calcutta Football Legue Premier Division matches.

As far as artificial turf is concerned, it has been learnt that contracts for setting up four artificial turf fields in Shillong (Meghalaya), Imphal (Manipur), Bangalore and Cooperage (Mumbai) have been signed by FIFA, while the Barasat Stadium in Kolkata and Tilak Maidan in Goa are also understood to have got the nod.

At present, the Yuba Bharati Krirangan is the only football stadium in India with artificial turf.

[Suncity]

Culture of Corruption?

The TOI reports that Kolkata Municipal Corporation "under new management" is on a spending spree on the "cultural" front.

In the past five months KMC spent:

1) Rs 25 lakhs for a cultural programme at Citizens' Park, where KMC felicitated some of the city's celebrities.

2) Rs 35 lakhs for Kolkatasree award to organisers of Durga Pujas and a cultural event in Science city.

3) Rs 30 lakhs for a party at the Park Circus Maidan

Future crores could be spent on:

1) Taking over Uttam Mancha auditorium for 2 crores and refurbishing it for another 2.5 crores

Meanwhile the new Kolkata mayor loves cars.A fleet of five cars for the position have been ordered. These include 2 Scorpios and three luxury vehicles (one is a ten seater van with video conferencing facilities for the busy folks). There is also a new ambassador which the mayor apparently doesn't like.

Politicians will be politicians. But I wonder what our great intellectuals like Mahasweta Devi have to say.

The Lazy and the Heartless

We knew that the people in Writers Building are amongst the laziest creatures that ever graced this planet. But here's proof that they are heartless as well:

Who was the officer who laughed at Juthika Atta at Writers' Buildings on Monday? It was Gobinda Chandra Mondol, senior PA to special secretary A G Ghosh.

Read more: Joke' triggered scream that shook Writers' - The Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/c...#ixzz15mNT8JXo

Bandh Special

It's just not the political parties who specialize in bandhs (bharat, bangla). Now even "industries" are giving bandh calls.



Hosiery industry calls for bandh today to protest raw cotton price hike

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/ho...e-hike/713281/

Continuous hike in the prices of raw cotton in the domestic market has affected the hosiery industrialists all across the country a lot. Government’s nod to export raw cotton is the main reason, complain the industrialists, and as a matter of protest, West Bengal hosiery industry has given a nationwide call to observe one day token strike on Friday to protest this policy of government. Knitwear Club in Ludhiana has decided to support this call and they have appealed to all the hosiery units to be a part of the strike.

[SarafIndian]

Originally Posted by Suncity

Culture of Corruption?

The TOI reports that Kolkata Municipal Corporation "under new management" is on a spending spree on the "cultural" front.

In the past five months KMC spent:

1) Rs 25 lakhs for a cultural programme at Citizens' Park, where KMC felicitated some of the city's celebrities.

2) Rs 35 lakhs for Kolkatasree award to organisers of Durga Pujas and a cultural event in Science city.

3) Rs 30 lakhs for a party at the Park Circus Maidan

Future crores could be spent on:

1) Taking over Uttam Mancha auditorium for 2 crores and refurbishing it for another 2.5 crores

These are initials steps to make Kolkata another London