Malgudi series - 11
Almost half of Bengaluru is a collection of villages which joined
the urbane when city started growing helter skelter ! It is like those drawings in
which as and when we connect the dots in a particular numerical order it evolves
into an animal, bird etc.! If the order is missed we end up creating a mess …That’s the fate of growing Bengaluru !
One such village in Whitefield which was circumscribed by the
growing city was Nallurahalli (
Halli is a kannada name for village) which exists between the Whitefield main
road and the EPIP ( Export promotion industrial park), through this village
once can quickly reach Whitefield from the EPIP area which is the focus of this
blog !
Nallurahalli was a small hamlet of few hundred houses whose people
mainly depended on agriculture in the erstwhile years till the dawn of new
millennium. It was surrounded by fields and many lakes amongst which varthur
lake was the most prominent one. Though Whitefield in those days had bungalows
as well, they were mainly part of the farm houses which existed from the
British period including the one in which Kenneth Anderson and later his son
lived!
In the late nineties when the companies (especially from the IT
sector) started operating from EPIP Whitefield because of the tax sops they got
from the government, the neighborhood started seeing changes! People who work
in these companies were well paid and came from different parts of the country.
They wanted a decent home to live which is also close to their work.
That’s how the real estate picked up here. It din’t take much time
for the cultivated and cultivatable land around to get converted from green
belt to yellow belt (Agri to revenue) and whoever had an acre or two became crorepatis
overnight! Land was purchased by builders as fast as they could and
construction started at full pace to cater to the booming market!
Villas, row houses, apartments, villaments, complexes were
constructed without any planning and forethought! Each builder was just worried
about his project and was oblivious to the obvious problems that could arise in
future because of the lack of water, parks and recreation centers, waste
disposal and sewage, road approach and traffic problems etc. and the result
ultimately is the most congested, suffocating, high profile property chunk of
Bengaluru!
For a long time, people use to avoid the nallurhalli village road
which connected EPIP to Whitefield because of two reasons. One-It was small, tiny
with kids playing around and went through the varandas of poor houses, Two- It
was notorious before it joined Nallurhalli where people would get robbed from strangers
who were taking cover in the open fields at a certain distance from the village
and after EPIP (Whitefield police station!).
This scene changed by 2009 when more and more people started using
this road as the other roads from ITPL to EPIP, varthur to kundalahalli were
not able to cater to traffic because of unplanned U-Turns. People especially
car and two wheelers started pouring into to avoid the traffic and signals!
Initially the numbers were less but later cabs and buses also started using
these roads causing a lot of misery, frustration and tension to the villagers!
Their kids, cows and buffaloes, elderly got affected on a daily basis.
Their festivities and public gatherings got distracted by the
continuous outpour of vehicles round the clock. Remember these houses were
attached to the 30 feet road and many became sleep deprived. All this started
building up the tension and there were many cases of stone pelting, argument
and fights between the inhabitants and the people who used the road. There were
cases of attempt to murders when some arguments dint go the way it was supposed
to!
In most of the cases the educated dint understand the misery poor
villagers were going through and the villagers misunderstood the affluent class
as the ones who are the cause for their misery!
Fast forward to 2016, the nallurahalli road is the most sought
after in the area! Both sides of the road flaunts 2 and 3 BHK apartments which are ready to
occupy for 75-80 lakhs! Though the road is in pathetic state, you will see
people walking, jogging and taking their dogs for outing!
Potholes and sewage chambers in the middle of the road which makes
the drive or ride in the busy and congested road even worser than before! The
tankers which use to fetch water to the entire Whitefield from bore well road
are now catering to the apartments only in the nallurhalli region because of
the sudden spike in the demand and hence blocking the road furthermore!
Now you don’t see the tiny houses and verandas, elderly sitting on
the road side benches chitchatting and local festivities like before! Probably
the people existed there might have been taken care by the local leaders /
builders but moving them away or getting them one or two flats in the land
owner share and some money as part of the settlement!
The question is how do they pay the maintenance of the flats they
have got? Have they given those flats for rent? Did they save the money they
got out of the deal? With the cultivatable land gone what do they do for
living? Have they joined the same
companies whom they blamed as housekeeping staff? If they stay in the apartment
where their house once existed how do, they feel? Do they still feel they
belong there? what do the new flat owners feel for these people who barely can
speak the elite language and can’t dress up like them?
Nallurahalli has really changed in few years, so does many villages
which became food for the growing monster……. not for good!
