Indian Institute of Science, which was established in 1909 in Bengaluru, is the premier institute for scientific research and study in India. Nationally renowned professional institutes such as the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS), University of Agricultural Sciences, Bengaluru (UASB)Institute of bioinformatics and applied biotechnology National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad (NID), National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT), National Law School of India University (NLSIU), the Indian Institute of Management, Bengaluru (IIM-B), the Indian Statistical Institute and International Institute of Information Technology, Bengaluru (IIIT-B) are located in Bengaluru. The city is also home to the premier mental health institution in India National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (NIMHANS). Bengaluru also has some of the best medical colleges in the country, like St. John’s Medical College (SJMC) and Bengaluru Medical College and Research Institute (BMCRI). The M. P. Birla Institute of Fundamental Research research institute has a branch located in Bengaluru.
On 11 December 2005, the Government of Karnataka announced that it had accepted a proposal by Jnanpith Award winner U. R. Ananthamurthy to rename Bengaluru to Bengaluru. On 27 September 2006, the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) passed a resolution to implement the proposed name change. The Government of Karnataka accepted the proposal, and it was decided to officially implement the name change from 1 November 2006. However, this process has stalled due to delays in getting clearances from the Union Home Ministry.
Public sector employment and education provided opportunities for Kannadigas from the rest of the state to migrate to the city. Bengaluru experienced rapid growth in the decades 1941–51 and 1971–81, which saw the arrival of many immigrants from northern Karnataka. By 1961, Bengaluru had become the sixth largest city in India, with a population of 1,207,000. In the decades that followed, Bengaluru’s manufacturing base continued to expand with the establishment of private companies such as MICO (Motor Industries Company), which set up its manufacturing plant in the city. Bengaluru experienced a growth in its real estate market in the 1980s and 1990s, spurred by capital investors from other parts of the country who converted Bengaluru’s large plots and colonial bungalows into multi-storied apartments. In 1985, Texas Instruments became the first multinational corporation to set up base in Bengaluru. Other information technology companies followed suit and by the end of the 20th century, Bengaluru had established itself as the Silicon Valley of India.
The Bengaluru City Police (BCP) has six geographic zones, includes the Traffic Police, the City Armed Reserve, the Central Crime Branch and the City Crime Record Bureau and runs 86 police stations, including two all-women police stations. As capital of the state of Karnataka, Bengaluru houses important state government facilities such as the Karnataka High Court, the Vidhana Soudha (the home of the Karnataka state legislature) and Raj Bhavan (the residence of the Governor of Karnataka). Bengaluru contributes three members to the lower house of the Parliament of India, the Lok Sabha, and 28 members to the Karnataka State Assembly.
The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP, Greater Bengaluru Municipal Corporation) is in charge of the civic administration of the city. It was formed in 2007 by merging 100 wards of the erstwhile Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike, with seven neighbouring City Municipal Councils, one Town Municipal Council and 110 villages around Bengaluru. The BBMP is run by a city council composed of 250 members, including 198 corporators representing each of the wards of the city and 52 other elected representatives, consisting of members of Parliament and the state legislature. Elections to the council are held once every five years, with results being decided by popular vote. Members contesting elections to the council usually represent one or more of the state’s political parties. A mayor and deputy mayor are also elected from among the elected members of the council. Elections to the BBMP were held on 28 March 2010, after a gap of three and a half years since the expiry of the previous elected body’s term, and the Bharatiya Janata Party was voted into power – the first time it had ever won a civic poll in the city.
Vagale, Uday Kumar. “Public Space in Bengaluru: Present and Future Projections” PDF (773 KB). Digital Libraries and Archives. 2006. Virginia Tech. 27 April 2004.
12.97°N 77.56°E and covers an area of 741 km² (286 mi²). The majority of the city of Bengaluru lies in the Bengaluru Urban district of Karnataka and the surrounding rural areas are a part of the Bengaluru Rural district. The Government of Karnataka has carved out the new district of Ramanagara from the old Bengaluru Rural district.
A rapid transit system called the Namma Metro is being built. A 7 km stretch from Bayappanahalli to MG Road was opened to public on 20 October 2011. Once completed, this will encompass a 42.3 km (26.3 mi) elevated and underground rail network comprising 41 stations. It is expected to connect central locations in Bengaluru to Devanahalli and the Chikballapur regions. This much-delayed project is the city’s primary response to the worsening intra-city transport infrastructure which has become a major deterrent to continued business growth.
A succession of South Indian dynasties ruled the region of Bengaluru until in 1537 AD, Kempé Gowda—a feudatory ruler under the Vijayanagara Empire—established a mud fort considered to be the foundation of modern Bengaluru. Following transitory occupation by the Marathas and Mughals, the city remained under the Mysore kingdom, which is now a part of the Indian state of Karnataka. Bengaluru continued to be a cantonment of the British and a major city of the Princely State of Mysore which existed as a nominally sovereign entity of the British Raj. Following the independence of India in 1947, Bengaluru became the capital of Mysore state, and remained capital when the new Indian state of Karnataka was formed in 1956. With a Gross domestic product of $83 billion, Bengaluru is listed 4th among the top 15 cities contributing to India’s overall GDP.
According to a 2012 report submitted to the World Bank by Karnataka Slum Clearance Board, Bengaluru has 862 slums from total of around 2000 slums in Karnataka. It is estimated that about 20% of Bengaluru population reside in urban slums. The families living in the slum are not ready to move into the temporary shelters. 42% of the households migrated from different parts of India and 43% of the households had remained in the slums for over 10 years. The Karnataka Municipality, works to shift 300 families annually to newly constructed buildings. One third of these slum clearance projects lack basic service connections, 60% of slum dwellers lack complete water supply lines and share BWSSB water supply.
According to the 2001 census of India, 79.4% of Bengaluru’s population is Hindu, roughly the same as the national average. Muslims comprise 13.4% of the population, which again is roughly the same as the national average, while Christians and Jains account for 5.8% and 1.1% of the population, respectively, double that of their national averages. Anglo-Indians also form a substantial group within the city.Vokkaligas, Reddys, Lingayats, Kodavas, Komatis, Sindhis and Brahmins are the most significant communities of Bengaluru. Women make up 47% of Bengaluru’s population. The city has a literacy rate of 89%. Roughly 10% of Bengaluru’s population lives in slums—a relatively low proportion when compared to other cities in the developing world such as Mumbai (50%) and Nairobi (60%). The 2008 National Crime Records Bureau statistics indicate that Bengaluru accounts for 8.5% of the total crimes reported from 35 major cities in India which is a cascadial increase in the crime rate when compared to the number of crimes fifteen years ago.
After the fall of the Vijayanagara Empire, Bengaluru’s rule changed hands several times. Kempé Gowda declared independence, then in 1638, a large Adil Shahi Bijapur army led by Ranadulla Khan and accompanied by Shahji Bhonslé defeated Kempé Gowda III, and Bengaluru was given to Shahji as a jagir (feudal estate). In 1687, the Mughal general Kasim Khan, under orders from Aurangzeb, defeated Ekoji I, son of Shahji, and leased Bengaluru to Chikkadevaraja Wodeyar (1673–1704), the ruler of Mysore kingdom. After the death of Krishnaraja Wodeyar II in 1759, Hyder Ali, Commander-in-Chief of the Mysore Army, proclaimed himself the de facto ruler of Mysore. The kingdom later passed to Hyder Ali’s son Tipu Sultan.
Bengaluru comes under Bengaluru railway division of the South Western Railway zone of the Indian Railways. Bengaluru City Railway station and Yesvantpur Junction connect it to the rest of the country through the Indian Railways. The Bengaluru Rajdhani Express connects the city to New Delhi, the capital of India. Bengaluru is also connected by rail to most cities in Karnataka, as well as Mumbai,Kochi, Chennai, Coimbatore, Kolkata, Hyderabad, Indore, Belgaum, Hubli, Mysore, Bhagalpur, Tatanagar, Bhopal, and other major cities in India. The sprawling Rail Wheel Factory is Asia’s second largest manufacturer of Wheel & Axle for Railways and headquartered in Yelahanka, Bengaluru.
Bengaluru experiences a tropical savanna climate (Köppen climate classification Aw) with distinct wet and dry seasons. Due to its high elevation, Bengaluru usually enjoys a more moderate climate throughout the year, although occasional heat waves can make things very uncomfortable in the summer. The coolest month is December with an average low temperature of 15.4 °C and the hottest month is April with an average high temperature of 32.8 °C. The highest temperature ever recorded in Bengaluru is 38.9 °C(recorded in March 1931) and the lowest ever is 7.8 °C (recorded in January 1884). Winter temperatures rarely drop below 12 °C (54 °F), and summer temperatures seldom exceed 34–35 °C (<100 °F). Bengaluru receives rainfall from both the northeast and the southwest monsoons and the wettest months are September, October and August, in that order. The summer heat is moderated by fairly frequent thunderstorms, which occasionally cause power outages and local flooding. The heaviest rainfall recorded in a 24-hour period is 179 millimetres (7.0 in) recorded on 1 October 1997.
Bengaluru fort was captured by the British armies under Lord Cornwallis on 21 March 1791 during the Third Anglo-Mysore War and formed a centre for British resistance against Tipu Sultan. Following Tipu Sultan’s death in the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War (1799), the British returned administrative control of the Bengaluru “pete” to the Maharaja of Mysore, choosing only to retain the Cantonment under their jurisdiction. The ‘Residency’ of Mysore State was first established in Mysore city in 1799 and later shifted to Bengaluru in the year 1804. It was abolished in the year 1843 only to be revived in 1881 at Bengaluru and to be closed down permanently in 1947, with Indian independence.
Bengaluru generates about 3,000 tonnes of solid waste per day, of which about 1,139 tonnes are collected and sent to composting units such as the Karnataka Composting Development Corporation. The remaining solid waste collected by the municipality is dumped in open spaces or on roadsides outside the city. In 2008, Bengaluru produced around 2,500 metric tonnes of solid waste, and increased to 5000 metric tonnes in 2012, which is transported from collection units located near Hesaraghatta Lake, to the garbage dumping sites. The city suffers significantly with dust pollution, hazardous waste disposal, and disorganized, unscientific waste retrievals. The IT hub, Whitefield region is the most polluted area in Bengaluru.
Bengaluru has a handful of freshwater lakes and water tanks, the largest of which are Madivala tank, Hebbal lake, Ulsoor lake and Sankey Tank. Groundwater occurs in silty to sandy layers of the alluvial sediments. The Peninsular Gneissic Complex (PGC) is the most dominant rock unit in the area and includes granites, gneisses and migmatites, while the soils of Bengaluru consist of red laterite and red, fine loamy to clayey soils.
Bengaluru has a number of elite clubs, like Century Club, The Bengaluru Golf Club, the Bowring Institute and the exclusive Bengaluru Club, which counts among its previous members Winston Churchill and the Maharaja of Mysore. The Hindustan Aeronautics Limited SC is based in Bengaluru. Other sports personalities from Bengaluru include national swimming champion Nisha Millet, world snooker champion, Pankaj Advani and former All England Open badminton champion Prakash Padukone.
Bengaluru has a number of newspapers and magazines that cater to the varied interests. number of news channels operate in the city, as well as in the state too. Magazines like Open and 080 cater to lifestyle, citizen issues and fashion, newspapers like Mid-Day, Bengaluru Mirror, Vijaya Karnataka and Udayavani provide localised news updates. On the web, Explocity provides listings information. Deccan Herald, The Times of India and The Hindu provide e-paper services.
Bengaluru is also a major center of Indian classical music and dance. Classical music and dance recitals are widely held throughout the year and particularly during the Ramanavami and Ganesha Chaturthi festivals.