📍 🇮🇳 Bangalore - perception & history

"Bangalore is known especially for its beautiful parks, wide avenues, busy bazaars, and pleasant climate. It’s a thousand meters above sea level and usually feels somewhat cooler than most South Indian cities, even in midsummer. Most of the city is rather modern… In fact, it’s the second-most westernized city in India, next to Mumbai, with a population of more than 4,000,000. But… (it) is (also) where you can get a feel for the earlier culture of the area. The streets there are narrow and winding, and the older temples and cottage industries and historical landmarks are also there".

With this introduction, Stephen Knapp, author, journalist and spiritualist, describes Bangalore, the regional capital of the southern Indian state of Karnataka. The brand of Bangalore is known world over, as the Information Technology (IT) Capital of India and as the Silicon Valley of India; sometimes Bangalore is even used as a verb, where being Bangalored implies one's position, function or employee is being outsourced to India, especially Bangalore. 

The rich and layered history of Bangalore City, since its foundation in the 1500s (or maybe even earlier), has passed through many different rulers, dynasties and kingdoms - even becoming the centre of British rule and administration in southern India. Post Indian Independence in 1947, Bangalore became the administrative capital of the erstwhile Mysore state, which was enlarged and incorporated as the state of Karnataka in 1960. The symbolic status of Bangalore as an administrative and political centre is the Vidhana Soudha - the seat of the legislative house and the various offices of the regional administration and ministries. The structure is a culmination of the various political rulers to have ruled this region, creating its own unique architectural style. It is inspired by ancient and medieval temple architecture of the Chalukya, Hoysala and Vijaynagar empires as well as modern British and American architecture, resulting in a structure that summarises the rich political history of this region, from its inception to the present.

____ Sources ____ 
>> Stephen Knapp, Spiritual India Handbook. Jaico Publishing House, Bangalore, 2009.