Bengaluru: A day of massive jam, protests & Cauveri water row

Bengaluru witnessed massive traffic on Wednesday, with vehicles stuck on roads for hours, many of which faced breakdowns. The Outer Ring Road (ORR) area of the city was the worst hit, as people complained that they had been stuck there for over five hours.It took five hours or more to cover distances as little as 20 km.The development came a day after the Bengaluru bandh, called by 'Karnataka Jala Samrakshana Samiti', an umbrella outfit of farmers and Kannada organisations. The bandh was called to protest against the release of Cauvery river water to Tamil Nadu.Meanwhile, the 12-hour strike in the Karnataka capital saw some action when Members of Cauvery Urimai Meetpu Kulu staged a 'rail roko' protest in Thanjavur by blocking the Cholan Express train. They even condemned the Karnataka government for releasing Tamil Nadu's share of water in the the Cauvery River. The protestors were later arrested by the police.
The full scale of the gridlock began to emerge only around 3 pm as office-goers and outbound travellers flocked to the ORR and other streets. The unusual rise in traffic in Bengaluru on Wednesday have been caused by several reasons. Comedian Trevor Noah, who is on his India tour, had his shows cancelled in Bengaluru, which was supposed to take place in the Outer Ring Road area.the long weekend that prompted outbound travellers to scoot out of the city in personal vehicles. Waterlogging and vehicle breakdowns compounded the problem.The traffic was twice more than the usual vehicle count, which was supposed to be between 1.5 to 2 lakh. However, 3.59 lakh vehicles plied today by 7:30 pm, according to the IBI traffic report.Twitter users were angry at the administration for the traffic. "Absolutely horrendous traffic today, took 5 hrs to commute to and fro for office. Bangalore traffic at it's peak!" a user wrote.

Not to forget kids. Some school buses dropped kids at 8 pm!

Our kids definitely deserve better. pic.twitter.com/xIxRy1Kq0V

— Samit Singh (@kumarsamit) September 27, 2023

There were Ganesh Visarjan processions in most parts of the city, that also caused a congestion on the roads. Meanwhile,as per the Cauvery Water Regulation Committee in New Delhi on Tuesday recommended Karnataka release 3000 cusecs of water every day at Biligundlu starting from 8 a.m. on September 28 to October 15.Former Karnataka Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy has blamed the Congress government for all this mess.He said the protesters and farmers should be released immediately, adding Cauvery water flow to Tamil Nadu should be stopped.Slamming the opposition BJP and JD(S) for politicizing the Cauvery row, Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah rejected allegations that his government has failed on the issue and said his administration has never lagged in protecting the interests of the state, its people, and farmers.
Amid political chaos, a peculiar incident took place after where a dead rat was found in breakfast served to cops.According to news agency ANI, a dead rat was found in the breakfast served to police assigned on security duty in Bengaluru amid a bandh and protests called by farmers over the Cauvery water dispute.A case will be registered against the hotel owner. Luckily, the matter came to light beforehand while no one had eaten the dead rat food.

(Dr Mysi Patil, State Correspondent)