It all started on a random Friday when serial cat-spotter and resident of India’s cat capital Meowmbai, Sandesh Samant spotted an orange fluffball at the Gundavali Mero station. He snapped a pic and shared it on Twitter (aka X).
The Maha Mumbai Operations Corporation Limited responded quickly by announcing that the ginger was their CFO, or Chief Feline Officer, responsible for station inspection, commuter observation and sitting where commuters could admire them.
We’re not complaining. We love cats in transit. They’re cute, and take away the stress.
We’ve seen felines on duty at other metro systems too, notably on Bengaluru’s Namma Metro where a feline was caught napping on the job.
A round of cheer for the MMMOCL for promoting the furball to CFO and let’s hope other metro systems get their CFOs too!
Update: MMMOCL has shared an entire video of their CFO on duty; do head to their social media and check it out.
Do double tap on the screen to like this video, and hit the subscribe button for more videos.
Oh, and I used to post a lot of pictures of cats on public transport. Till American big tech which preaches a lot about freedom of speech took away my freedom of speech.
If you would like to support me, do tweet out to Elon Musk and Nikita Bier, asking them to “Bring Back @rsrikanth05”
Thank you for watching the video. I apologise for the amateur video but its the first time I’ve made one from scratch.
Please do like the video, subscribe to the channel and share the video.
The newspaper article said that I had been advocating for the NCMC since 2023; which is only partially true. I have been advocating for a common mobility instrument for over a decade; if you go back to articles from 2016 on my blog, you’d find posts on them. You’d have found them on my Twitter too, but that’s the problem. I used to be pretty active in documenting local urban infrastructure in various cities of India, especially, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Chennai. Plus there was the fare share of lame jokes from me. All that stopped in 2021 when the “free-speech” warriors of Twitter (or X) decided that I should not have any and took away my old account, along with 14 years of content that was written by me. To quote myself: “The person who talks the loudest on empathy, will show the least empathy”. Similarly, the companies that talk endlessly about freedom of expression are the ones who will be the first to take you down.
If you would like to support me, do tweet out to Elon Musk and Nikita Bier, asking them to “Bring Back @rsrikanth05”
As for BMTC and the NCMC; nobody knows about the hold-up. June came and went. July came and went. Only the NCMC compatibility didn’t come.
While the BMTC gets its act together, make sure you get your NCMC. You can use it across multiple cities in India (a map will be shared soon), and on the Namma Metro, you get a flat 5% discount on all trips along with an additional 5% (aka 10 % off) during non-peak hours and Sundays.
Okay, so this post should have gone out yesterday (9 July) but it didn’t. I’ve been a bit busy off late and haven’t been able to post much. I have at least six pending drafts that I intend to publish before this month ends.
I started this blog on 9 July 2015 because I wanted to write and after an internship that used WordPress, I wanted to do something of my own, with WordPress. Over the next five years there have been ups and downs, this blog has taken me places, gotten me internships and more. It also led to me picking up a career in writing (one that is no longer), but still.
I want to take a moment and thank some folks out there for their support. A shoutout to my Transit Group and its myriad members, folks who I’ve met thru my days at Swarajya and UnFound, folks that I’ve come across on Twitter, SkyscraperCity, The UnrealTimes, FEE and OpIndia, folks who have helped me out.
Anyway, I should now head back to getting those drafts published so that you folks can read it. I intend to cross the previous monthly records (10 posts in December 2015 and 12 posts in June 2020) as we continue to remain locked up due to the Wuhan Virus pandemic.
Also, a special shoutout to Sagar Aghore and his Brother P-Touch H110 for the featured image.
P.S: It is ironic that Google decided to chose this date to suspend my AdSense account. I’ve written a lot in May and June, pretty consistent and thus my traffic went up. As a result of that, ad revenue also shot up. So last month Google decided that it will play the role of the big, bad regulator and killed my ad revenue by limited the number of ads. Now, with practically zero ads on my site, it has come to the amazing conclusion that there were fraudulent clicks (WHEN THERE WERE NO ADS VISIBLE) and has suspended my account for a month.
If you want to know why I don’t trust Big Tech, especially Google, watch Season 7 of Elementary. Odker and Google are very similar.
It has been a very interesting journey so far, blogging about buses (and stuff that have no connection to buses but still linking them to buses).
If you want to know why I love buses, I’d suggest you reading an earlier blog post: My Fascination With Buses!
At this juncture, I look back and reflect on a lot of stuff that I have done in the past and where all it has got me. Blogging (especially about Buses) has taken me places and I really am glad about it.
I managed to attend the CII Partnership Summit and Make In India Week earlier this year only because of my blogging skills. I was hired as an intern because my employers were impressed with my blog.
Last year, I managed to see Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden live (not performing music mind you) at BNLF because I was a blogger.
So, a bunch of thanks go around:
IndiBlogger: They got the best of me on the blog. Posts for various drives and campaigns from International Toilet Day to the Chennai Floods. Yo can see my IndiVine posts here.
BlogChatter: For their wonderful prompts and campaigns, and weekly chats. I’ve met so many fellow bloggers and learnt so much more from them. A special shoutout to my Blogbuddy teams: InkingPages (2.0) and WriteOn (3.0)!
Swarajya: For publishing my articles on Transport and matters that affect Urban Life a lot (and for sending some traffic this way). You can read my Swarajya articles here.
The Unreal Times: Undoubtedly India’s best satire portal, for giving me chance to make others laugh. You can laugh at my work here.
OpIndia: I get to do the unconventional bit of writing. That unconventional stuff can be seen here.
Yes. I’ve come a long way thanks to the writing community at large, and I am really grateful to them. Thank you guys!
And now, for an image of what drove me to start this blog:
BEST Bus No. 56 at Versova Yari Road Bus Station. Image copyright Srikanth Ramakrishnan, CC-BY-SA 4.0 International, available on the Wikimedia Commons.
BESTpedia has turned a year old. I’m just doing a quick recap of what all has happened in the past one year.
The first post went live on 9th July 2015. There has been no looking back ever since. Of course, Analytics didn’t make an appearance till a month later on 19th August. So, there is little hope of finding out what the hit count was that month, but then, the past is the past.
Anyway, moving on, July saw 6 posts, with two highly successful posts on BEST [Electronic Tickets and Curious Case of BEST AC Buses] and one Fiction Post on Bus 8954.
August saw a two really popular posts among others. Branded Bus Services, and Sherlock’s Day Out were both incredibly popular with the latter getting close to 600 shares on StumbleUpon.
September saw some offbeat posts including ideas and a post on temples, and the first entity that wasn’t directly on the blog [later, part of the Stupindex]. Visits dropped from around 800 to 500 a month however.
October saw a rise in the number of hits with six posts. It also marked the first occurrence of a series of several satire posts on the blog. It was in this month that I got to attend IndiBlogger’s #BNLF in Mumbai.
November marked a significant change for the blog. 10 posts were made, the highest per month till date. It was also the first time that number of visits crossed 1000, ending at 1606. It also marked my first major interaction with the IndiBlogger community with their #madeofgreat series of contests.
December continued on the same high as November. Six posts were made, including two on Delhi [where I was working], one on the Chennai floods, 2 on BESTs plans for buses to Imagica and Parking Lots at Depots, and one on the Bullet Train.The last post for 2015, published at 11.45pm on 31-12-15, was a major one on Amaravati, which went semi viral and got the blog loads of shares the next month. A total of 2245 visits came in December.
January got off to a good start, mainly thanks to the spillover traffic from December. It also witnessed the first two guest posts on the blog. A total of five articles were posted, but due to the traction gained by the Amaravati listicle in December, the month saw 3238 hits, a figure that was exceeded only twice after that. In fact, the first one week alone led to a huge spike in the number of hits, with the 1000 mark being crossed in the first week itself.
February saw a slight slump in articles, with the first article coming out at the start of the third week and the only other article in the month coming out on the 28th. The #MakeInIndia article got good traction however, with Amitabh Kant, CEO of NITI Aayog, as well as the DIPP retweeting my tweet linking to the article.
March saw a slight comeback with 6 posts. The piece on JnNURM buses violating norms was a significantly investigative one, which did get positive feedback from transport lovers. The month saw my first active participation with #BlogChatter as well. The major post of the month however, was the Public Service Announcement produced with my friend Deepak.
April saw 5 posts with one of them being a highly successful guest post by GSR Chaitanya of LoveOfZ about Hyderabad, and a super popular tongue-in-cheek April Fool’s Day post on Taxi services that was quite popular.
May saw 5 posts, with Dork Guru returning to do one more guest post as a follow up to my post. Traffic remained average with 2959 visits. A new feature, titled Unsung Heroes Made an appearance. It also saw the formal creation of The Stupindex as a Table of Contents for all the off-blog inanities around here.
June saw 3450 hits, the highest till date, with a significant amount of traffic coming in from Swarajya Magazine where I had written an article on Highway Strips which was extremely popular. 6 posts were made, including another satire post [BEST Dish of the Day] that got me a comment and a share from Purba Ray. The last article of the month on Zeppelins was also popular after Jayaprakash Narayan of the Lok Satta Party retweeted a link to it on Twitter.
July has so far seen only one article with this one being the second. A total of 70 articles have been posted prior to this with a total of 576 comments and pingbacks/trackbacks. At the time of writing this post, the blog has received a total of 25,320 hits!
It has been a completely amazing ride in the last one year as a blogger. A sincere round of applause for the readers, fellow bloggers, and everyone out there who has encouraged me.
Now a few acknowledgements are in order:
Team #Blogchatter: For all the amazing support and motivation. I’m also the Blogstar of the Week!
The IndiTeam from IndiBlogger: For all their IndiVine topics that helped me write a lot.
I’d strongly suggest going thru the individual links of the various people mentioned above. They’re in many ways responsible for the vibrant environment that I am in.
So a lot of us have had an issue with Transit in our daily life. Buses may be late, trains may be dirty, autos may overcharge, and the list goes on.
The general solution till a while back would be to call up the Authorities, tell them your problems, let them ignore it and go on.
But not anymore. In today’s age and times, many Government Transcos as well as Private ones are online! You can always send out a tweet and wait till you get a reply. Such is the power of Social Media.
A group of us have planned a Hashtag for this on Twitter and Instagram; #TransitIssuesIN.
Now; the power of Social Media is a well known fact. With more government bodies and private parties getting onto the Social Media bandwagon, it is easy to ensure that this reaches the right person. And Twitter and Instagram, ensure that it remains in Public view, or to be a little legal, ‘On Record’.
How do we go about this?
Simple, let us follow a small procedure.
First, ensure you have a Twitter and Instagram account. Follow accounts of people you know, people who can help share and amplify your content. You can follow me [@Rsrikanth05 on Twitter, @Rsrikanth05 on Instagram], and the blog [@BESTpedia on Twitter].
Second, connect your Twitter and Instagram accounts. Click here to learn how to do so. However, since Twitter doesn’t show photos uploaded to Instagram as native images and only provides a link to Instagram, the best thing to do would be to use IFTTT to link the two. IFTTT [short for IF This Then That], allows you to create a Recipe to make your Instagram photos appear as Native images on Twitter. Click here to find out more about this recipe.
Third, upload your image. Let IFTTT share it on Twitter. Ensure you use the Hashtag: #TransitIssuesIN at the start of your post.
And that’s it. You’re done. Let the power of Social Media take your post up. Let us try and create a revolution that forces these service providers to sit up and take heed of the problems that they often cause, irrespective of whether it is Intentional or Accidental.
#TransitIssuesIN
Why Instagram and Twitter?
Simple, both are public platforms [unless you keep your account private, which dilutes the purpose this entire exercise], both are simple, and easy to use. The impact of an image on the human mind is far superior to text, and images are more likely to be viewed in search results on Twitter.
Note: 18 April, 2021: I have struck out Pooja’s name because of her current position as a member of the Indian National Congress. The Congress has been a shameful party during the 2020-2021 Wuhan Virus Pandemic and anyone associated with the party or supporting it needs to be ashamed.
This is just an update on the things that may change on this blog in the near future.
For starters, this is the 50th post on the blog. Yes. 50th. I couldn’t have reached 50 posts without the support of various people around me, including the online friends that I have made in the last few months.
Among these 50 posts are two guest posts by a friend of mine, who isn’t going to reveal his real name to anyone. A few more guest posts, on various topics, including Indian Railways, BEST, Ahmedabad Janmarg, PMPML and buses in Abu Dhabi are all in the pipeline. A lot of interesting updates have been planned for the months of March-April-May, so stay tuned to BESTpedia. A new theme, and a new sub-blog is also in the pipeline!
For those who want to stay updated, I’d recommend that you add the RSS feed to you browser. The RSS feed is accessible at https://bestpedia.in/feed/
If you use Feedly or Bloglovin’, here are some links that could work well for you.
The #MakeInIndia week at Mumbai has been quite an eventful one. A lot has been learned here, and I have understood a lot about various things.
Barring an unfortunate incident involving a fire at the Maharashtra Night cultural program at Girgaum Chowpatty, the event has been a largely successful one.
Among the various exhibits and tidbits I managed to gather over the last two days while covering the event, here are some:
Amitabh Kant, Secretary of Industrial Policy and Promotion stressed on the need to not only Manufacture in India, but also Invent, Innovate and Design in India.
Scania and Volvo had got their new buses.
The Scania was the same bus that had been given to the Nagpur Mahanagar Parivahan Limited. It is India’s first bio-fuel bus, and it’s components are mostly sourced from India itself.
The Volvo was a Hybrid B7RLE/8400 model that NMMT had ordered. Of course, this does mean that BEST’s AC services are going to take a hit, but that is a different story altogether.
Ministers and industrialists spoke about road connectivity, rail connectivity, and inland water transport. While the former two were with regard to connecting ports, the latter was to decongest ports and roads. Now, if one can equate Passenger and Cargo traffic, you could come to the conclusion that a set-up for Freight should ideally work for a Set-up for Passengers as well, with minor modifications. This needs to be explored big time. The ship-building industry has a vast potential in India, and this needs to be explored big time by major cities, especially Mumbai, Surat, Chennai, Kolkata, and Mangalore. Connecting Ports to Hinterland with Rail, Road, and Inland Waterways will be a big boon for people living in the vicinity. It will encourage healthy competition [not the BEST vs NMMT kind, which is toxic] among different modes, and boost trade and productivity.
Amitabh Kant stressed on the need to manufacture more in India. While Services may form bulk of our economy, manufacturing is a must for it to be sustainable. This works in case of transport too. Buses need to be manufactured, trains need to be manufactured. With FDI is the rail sector, especially, high-speed rail, things are certainly set to change. He also mentioned that “Good quality Frugal Eningeering and Smartness must be combined to develop an Indian ability to manufacture”, which is true. One cannot directly apply global standards to India. India has different constraints, as well as requirements, and this must be taken care of.
Overall, I was part of several brilliant sessions, with various ministers, as well as Industrialists being part of there. I also, saw a lot of the exhibitions in vicinity.
Now, for other things:
The Fire
The fire that broke out at the Stage during the Maharashtra Night cultural programme at Girgaum Chowpatti was a rather unfortunate one. It was a stray firework and of course, the event company must be penalised. It was an unfortunate event and the ever-awesome Mumbai Fire Brigade rushed to the spot in no time and had the fire under control with no casualties. Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis himself stayed back till the end of the rescue operation to ensure that all had been led to safety. What peeves me off is that while not only did political parties try and gain political mileage out of this, but certain people went to the extent of calling it “Fake In India”, mocking the entire event, and making fun of a calamity, by way of which, they insulted the work done by the Firemen, as well as the Organisers of the entire event [not just the Cultural Programme].
The Auto Strike
Auto-Walas chose the wrong week to strike. Auto drivers across the city decided to strike on Monday 15th February in a protest against cab aggregators and illegal buses in the city as well as raised fares for issuing auto permits. However, BEST saved the day. BEST ran close to 90 extra services, ferrying 12 million people more on that day than the previous, and earning ₹5.2crore, which is ₹73lakh more than normal on that single day. However, BEST should have been running extra services to BKC, both Double-Deckers as well as special AC buses on that day, keeping the Make In India program in mind. Along with this, AC services should have been running on an hourly basis in and around BKC for the week. The strike didn’t impact NMMT or TMT much however, as it was within Mumbai city limits.
Other Observations
Nagpur Mahanagar Parivahan Limited [NMPL]’s Scania biofuel bus. Image copyright Srikanth Ramakrishnan, CC-BY-SA 4.0 International, available on the Wikimedia Commons.
The Scania Citybus that NMPL recieved in 2014 was present. The bus runs on an Ethanol based blend and is both eco-friendly as well as fuel efficient. The bus went to Nagpur because the Minister of Road Transport and Highways, Nitin Gadkari hails from Nagpur. One hopes that with MSRTC inducting Scanias into its fleet, BEST too would get this.
NMMT’s Volvo Hybrid Bus. Image Copyright Srikanth Ramakrishnan, CC BY SA 4.0 International, available on the Wikimedia Commons.
The new Volvo Hybrid bus that has been launched on the 8400 platform was on display. NMMT has purchased 5 of these buses that run on Diesel-CNG and this is definitely going to take a toll on BEST.
An airconditioned minivan built by Force Motors. Image copyright Srikanth Ramakrishnan, CC BY SA 4.0 International, available on the Wikimedia Commons.
Force Motors had on display, a minivan. This minivan seemed very comfortable, and reasonable luxurious. Personally, I believe it can be used as a Feeder service to the Metro.
Bajaj Qute. Image copyright Srikanth Ramakrishnan, CC BY SA 4.0 International, available on the Wikimedia Commons.
Bajaj’s Quadricycle, the Qute was also present there. The Qute can actually be used as an alternative for auto-rickshaws, or maybe be the Kaali-Peeli vs Cool Cab type.
And, the bonus:
BEML 205 Ton Dumper. Image copyright Srikanth Ramakrishnan, CC BY SA 4.0 International, available on the Wikimedia Commons.
The mammoth 205-ton dumper that Bharat Earth Movers Limited [BEML] built for mining purposes was also there.
Other observations and quotes:
In the food court, Falafels was using a Balaji Ticketing machine that Trimax uses for BEST and MSRTC.
Sadhguruji of the Isha Yoga Foundation was present, and made a few inspiring statements:
I’m a freelance Digital Media Marketing consultant. I was hired to cover the #MakeInIndia week on Social Media, and prior to this, I was part of CII’s Partnership Summit in Visakhapatnam in January 2016. Should you want to engage with me and my associates, please drop in a line at bestpedia[at]gmail[dot]com.
If you are sharing this post on Twitter, please do consider Retweeting the tweet below; it was RT’ed by Amitabh Kant himself.
![Nagpur Mahanagar Parivahan Limited [NMPL]'s Scania biofuel bus.](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MakeInIndia-NMPL-Scania-Ethanol.jpg)
