Bangalore

BANGALORE - Best Indian City to Live in
Pipping past the four metro cities of New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai, the southern technology hub Bangalore has emerged as the best city to live in India, a global survey said.

Despite its top Indian ranking, Bangalore's worldwide rank is very low at 141st position in a list of 221 cities globally in terms of standard of living, compiled by the 'Quality of Living Survey - Worldwide Rankings, 2011' by the global HR (human resources) consultancy major Mercer.

Vienna has been ranked as the world's best city to live in on the global list, which has five Indian cities -- Bangalore (141st), New Delhi (143rd), Mumbai (144th), Chennai (150th) and Kolkata (151st).

In another list of the world's best cities in terms of personal safety standards, Luxembourg has been placed on the top, followed by Bern, Helsinki, Zurich, Vienna, Geneva and Stockholm.

On this list, Indian cities have been ranked a little better, as Bangalore has got 117th place, New Delhi and Kolkata shared the 127th position, Mumbai is at 142 and Chennai is placed at 108th.

Bangalore has been ranked as the best Indian city both in terms of quality of living and the personal safety standards.

The personal safety ranking has been on measures of internal stability, crime levels, law enforcement effectiveness and host-country's international relations.

First phase of CRS will benefit four lakh passengers daily
Using the City’s existing rail infrastructure, the Commuter Rail Service (CRS) proposal offered suburbs-bound commuters a quick and cheap alternative, an escape from the gridlocked roads.

But, finding no mention in the Railway Budget 2013-14, CRS was destined for the cold storage. Informed experts and concerned citizens now want at least the first phase launched as a pilot skeletal service, with a few modifications to the project as envisaged by infrastructure consultants, Rail India Technical and Economic Solutions (RITES).

First, where the project stands today. The RITES had submitted its final report on the project to the State Directorate of Urban Land Transport (DULT) in August 2012. The BJP government in the State had reportedly cleared the CRS project in March 2013 in a Cabinet meeting and the proposal sent to the Railway Board in Lucknow.

However, the Board could not take a quick decision on the funding. Result: It found no mention in the railway budget.

Bangalore records highest number of residential launches
IDevelopers across the country launched an estimated 38,000 residential units in the first quarter of 2013, an almost 2% decline from the previous quarter due to factors such as sufficient availability of stock, subdued demand and delays in regulatory approvals in certain markets.

Bangalore saw the highest number of launches in the first quarter at 11,622 units contributing close to 31% of the overall new supply in the top eight cities followed by NCR that saw 7,603 units being launched and Mumbai with 7,226 units, according to a new report by global real estate consultancy, Cushman & Wakefield.

The NCR market saw a 40% decline in new launches over the last quarter. While Gurgaon accounted for 66% of the new launches, Noida saw only 34% launches — a decline of close to 70% due to subdued demand. This was also the main reason for the overall decline in the number of launches in Delhi NCR. Close to 80% units launched were in the mid-range segment, the report said.

Both Bangalore and Pune witnessed the highest number of unit launches (almost double) in the first quarter at 144% and 109% respectively. Hyderabad witnessed close to a 90% decline.

Bangalore population booms to 96 lakh
The population of Bangalore grew by about 30 lakh in 10 years, but its social indicators nosedived. The Primary Abstract of the Census of India 2011, released on Thursday, puts the city's population at 96,21,551 — a growth of 47.18% during 2001-2011.

The city has the lowest sex ratio of 916 women to 1,000 men, while Udupi has the highest: 1,094.

Bangalore also has the lowest work participation rate (WPR) among women, and ranks 14th in the state's 30 districts child sex ratio.

Only 24 women out of 100 in Bangalore go to work. Chitradurga has the highest WPR of 41.9. Of the 96.21 lakh populace, only 11.31 lakh women were found employed for a year before the enumeration was done on March 1, 2011.

Plustxt: Bangalore’s startup that allows mobile users to communicate in regional languages
Consumer demand for low-cost applications that can replace short text messaging on mobile phones helped spur the launch of a Bangalore-based startup Plustxt.

The messaging application not only offers an alternative to standard text messaging but also allows users to do so in regional language.

Pratyush Prasanna, co-founder of Plustxt Mobile Solutions, is of the view that conventional messaging will soon be redundant. "For the amount of data used for sending an sms, the charges are exorbitant," says the 32-year-old IIT-Kharagpur and IIM-Calcutta graduate who earlier worked with Microsoft, startup venture Gupshup and Xerox. "With increased penetration of smart phones and data there are other ways to communicate."

He joined hands with two of his colleagues from Gupshup, Lokesh Chouhan and Parag Arora, to start Plustxt last April. Lohith V, who was working with InMobi, joined the founding team earlier this year. In January the company launched two apps on the Android platform — Plustxt, an English-language messaging app similar to the globally popular Whatsapp, and Plustxt India, which allows users to communicate in eight regional languages.

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