Two-day protest, five-day joyride

Bangalore’s cabbies took a weekend break to join truckers on an indefinite strike to protest the rule making speed governors mandatory for commercial vehicles.

The Saturday and Sunday shutdown plan did not hit them hard as most BPOs and IT companies follow a five-day week. With cabs joining the strike, only a small number of 24/7 call centres had to make adjustments in their schedules.

Early on Monday morning, the cabs were back, picking up and dropping BPO workers in time for their shifts, after having kept their word to truckers’ unions and joining their strike.

The tussle over speed governors has been simmering for some time now, with the high court asking the transport department to enforce the rule as soon as possible.

But now, the second strike in as many months has found support from All India Motor Transport Congress members, who feel it is unfair to make speed governors compulsory for trucks that are only passing through Karnataka, not dropping and picking up goods. The matter could soon reach the transport ministry in Delhi.

Grab a bite, help women

A bite of pastry or a spoonful of ice cream from any of the 13 outlets of the capital’s oldest fast-food chain this weekend is likely to change women’s lives in rural Rajasthan.

Nirula’s, the quick-service chain that opened in 1934, has announced plans to donate 25 per cent of its earnings on March 8 and 9 to Khushi, an NGO that empowers women through self-help groups in the state’s Neemrana.

The donation from the initiative, which coincided with International Women’s Day on Saturday, will be used by the self-help groups to empower women financially and socially. Some groups may use it to buy kitchen equipment and begin producing snacks for sale.

Roller coaster of emotions

In films, she often had to play to the script. But actress Revathi stunned others and herself with an impromptu performance that left the audience clamouring for more.

The actress, who played Big B’s wife in Nishabd, had carried a prepared text to speak at a recent seminar. But soon she tossed it away to mesmerise the gathering with her candid recollections of Chennai.

“My early experience of Madras was that of a fortified space,” she reminisced about her days as an army officer’s daughter cooped up inside Fort St. George.

The speech left many, including Shobha De, who was one of the speakers on the dais, chuckling with delight.

The laughter dissolved into tears when, describing her days at the dance school in Thiruvellikeni and nationalist-poet Subrahmanya Bharathi’s house in the area, she couldn’t stop herself from breaking down.

The actress was apparently close to Bharathi and a regular at his place.

She capped her emotion-filled speech by asserting that a “city was, ultimately, what its people made it out to be”.

Save-river cry

If a Yamuna campaigner has his way, the Commonwealth Games Village could be shifted miles from the river.

Rajendra Singh told Delhi High Court recently that the enclave should come up at Safdarjung airport in south Delhi.

He said 200 acres were lying unused with the airport, which could be used for the village. Also, the place is closer to Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, one of the Games’s venues. He wanted the river banks to be free of structures.

Delhi: The Malladi brothers lend their vocal chords to N.S. Kalyanraman’s mridangam and tabla on Sunday. B. Raghavendrarao on the violin and Rajhesh Vaidhya on the veena will provide the background. The show begins at 10am in Kamani Auditorium on Copernicus Marg, Mandi House.