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Celebrating Environment
Presented by Rotary Avani
Speakers
A celebration of the 5 elements – Earth, Air, Water, Fire and Sky.
Avani is a movement initiated by Rotary Bengaluru, Lalbagh and curated by Beantown Union to provide a platform to create a tradition of environmental awareness. It aims to encourage civic participation to contribute to a sustainable city through ideas, conversations about causes that concern the environment.
The event will feature goodwill ambassador Yash, art exhibition, panel discussions, talks, film screening, cultural programs.
PROGRAMME
22 APRIL (Free Entry) | ||
10:00AM | BIC | Launch by the Avani Goodwill Ambassador Yash Tree planting by Rocking Star Yash. Smt. Gangambike Mallikarjun, Mayor of Bengaluru, will water the sapling. |
10:30AM | Art Gallery | Inaugural of Art Exhibition by Smt. Gangambike Mallikarjun, Mayor of Bengaluru Featuring artists Abdul Salam, Amrita Dhawan, Andrew Paul, Arpita Kar, Atoshi Shyam, Bhavna Kothari, Bikram Das, Deepak Joshi, Ganapati Hegde, Ganesh Selvaraj, Gopinath S, Jenny Pinto, Kavita Jaiswal, KT Arun, M D Parashar, Mark Rathinaraj, Milind Nayak, Mohan Vijayraghavan, Naina Maithani Kulkarni, Nijesh Mohan, Pradeep Unni, Remya Kumar, Romicon Revola, Rudragaud Indi, Sachin Deo, Shraddha Rathi |
6:00PM | Auditorium | Avani Anthem Video |
6:10PM | Auditorium | ‘Samaaj, Bazaar, Sarkaar: Converging for Conservation’ Keynote Address by Rohini Nilekani |
6:30PM | Auditorium
| Panel Discussion – ‘The 5 Elements’ Panel Introduction SKY: ‘Eye in the Sky – Earth Watch’ AIR: ‘Health Impact of Transport’ FIRE: ‘Sustainable Energy – a Perspective’ WATER: ‘Narratives and Imaginations’ EARTH: ‘A Map for the Future’ |
8:30PM | Auditorium | Screening of “Mission Mars” (23mins), |
23 APRIL – 5 JUNE (Free Entry) | ||
10:00AM – 9:00PM | BIC | Art Exhibition |
FILM FESTIVAL
23 APRIL | ||
11:30AM | Auditorium | Children’s Films Duma (100mins) |
4:30PM | Auditorium | Documentary Film An inconvenient sequel: Truth to power (99 mins) |
5:30PM – 6:00PM | Auditorium | Talk “Reviving Our Lakes”, By Anand Malligavad, Lake Conservationist |
7:30PM | Auditorium | Feature Films Civil Action (125 mins) |
24 APRIL | ||
11:30AM | Auditorium | Children’s Films Daroji (15mins) Gudekote (16 mins) Crabs of Karwar (12 mins) Water is Life, Don’t UnderMine it (5 mins) Gyamo – Queen of the Mountains (45 mins) |
4:30PM | Auditorium | Documentary Film Taste the Waste (92 mins) |
5:30PM – 6:00PM | Auditorium | Talk “The Miyawaki Method of Rapid Afforestation” by Sundar Padmanabhan |
7:30PM | Auditorium | Feature Films Before the Flood (96 mins) |
25 APRIL | ||
11:30AM | Auditorium | Children’s Films Fishi-RU (10mins) The Real Cost of Coal (7 mins) The Pray (12 mins) The Cry of the Paapa |
4:30PM | Auditorium | Documentary Film Climate Refugees (90 mins) |
5:30PM – 6:00PM | Auditorium | Talk “Planning for Bengaluru” by Leo Saldanha, Environment Support Group |
7:30PM | Auditorium | Feature Films Chinatown (134 mins) |
26 APRIL | ||
11:30AM | Auditorium | Children’s Films Princess Mononoke (kids above 10) (134 mins) |
27 APRIL | ||
11:30AM | Auditorium | Children’s Films Naledi – A Baby Elephants Tale (90 mins) |
4:30PM | Auditorium | Documentary Film Menstrual Man (63 mins) |
5:30PM – 6:00PM | Auditorium | Talk “Sustainable Menstruation” by Dr. Meenakshi Bharath |
7:30PM | Auditorium | Feature Films Erin Brockovich (132 mins) |
28 APRIL | ||
11:30AM | Auditorium | Children’s Films March of the Penguins (86 mins) |
4:30PM | Auditorium | Documentary Film Seed: The Untold Story (94 mins) |
5:30PM – 6:00PM | Auditorium | Talk “Endangered Species” by Raviraj K Joshi |
Speakers

Rohini Nilekani
Rohini Nilekani is Founder-Chairperson, Arghyam, a foundation she endowed to fund initiatives for sustainable water and sanitation across India. From 2004 to 2014, she was Founder-Chairperson of Pratham Books, a non-profit children’s publisher. She is Co-founder-Director of EkStep, a non-profit
education platform.
A former journalist writing for leading publications, she is also the author of “Stillborn” and “Uncommon Ground”, both published by Penguin Books India. In 2017, she was inducted as Foreign Honorary Member of the AmericanAcademy of Arts and Sciences.
As signatories of the Giving Pledge, Rohini and Nandan Nilekani have committed half their wealth to philanthropy.

Dr. Ashish Verma
Dr. Ashish Verma is a Ph.D. from IIT Bombay and currently serving as Associate Professor of Transportation Engg. at Dept. of Civil Engg., Centre for infrastructure, Sustainable Transportation, and Urban Planning (CiSTUP), and Robert Bosch Centre for Cyber Physical Systems (RBCCPS) at Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, India.
His research interests are in; sustainable transportation planning, transport and liveability, integrated public transport planning and management, modeling and optimization of transportation systems, travel behaviour, driver behaviour and road safety, intelligent transportation system (ITS), traffic management etc. He has authored more than 120 research publications in the area of sustainable transportation and road safety.
He is the Founding and Current President of the society Transportation Research Group of India (TRG). He is presently serving as, Vice Chair (Conference) of Scientific Committee, and Steering Committee Member of World Conference on Transport Research Society (WCTRS) based in University of Leeds, UK. He is also Co-Chair of Special Interest Group (SIG) H2 and G5 of WCTRS, which are focused on transportation in developing economies and disaster resilience.
Dr.Verma also engages actively with citizens group as important stakeholders in promoting sustainable transportation systems in Indian cities. The recent citizens’ campaigns in Bangalore like; Elevated Corridor Beda, Steel Flyover Beda, integration of namma metro with other public transport terminals, Shivananda Circle Flyover etc. are few examples where technical inputs from Dr.Verma’s lab. has helped Bengaluru with development of sustainable urban transport system.

Hariprasad Hegde
Hari would call himself a neo-generalist from the range of his work in deep engineering to executing large complex infrastructure projects to running a business. He is interested in matters related to ecological and societal wellbeing and curious of different genre of art, music and loves the mountains. Hari leads several sustainability initiatives at Wipro where he is the Senior Vice President, responsible for Global Operations; prior to this role he built and ran ‘Wipro Water’ the water treatment business of Wipro, grounds up. Energy, Water, Mobility, Sustainable Urbanization, are his areas of pursuit.
Hari was a core member of the industry working group of the ‘Planning Commission’ on ‘Land and Water’ and ‘Green Manufacturing’ for the 12 th Five Year Plan and its ‘Implementation advisory committee’ for the Water Resources Division. He sits on the ‘Asia Pacific World Regional Board’ of Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) and a member of the Executive Board of Indian Green Building Council. He chairs the Electronics City Industrial Township Authority (ELCITA); represents his company in industry bodies like CII and NASSCOM and is a member of the Board at Bangalore International Centre. A Mechanical Engineer by training and lives in Bangalore.

Dr. P. G. Diwakar
Dr. P. G. Diwakar is currently the Director of Earth Observations Applications and Disaster Management Programme Office of ISRO HQ. He Joined ISRO in 1984. He did his Ph.D from NIT-K, Suratkal in “Participatory Geomatics”. His research interests are Digital Image Processing, Geospatial Technologies and Software solutions in Space Technology Applications.
In the past 34 years, he held many important positions, such as Programme Director, Earth Observation Systems and Disaster Management Support Program (2011-2013); Deputy Director, National Remote Sensing Centre (2013 – 2016); Scientific Secretary (2016-2018). He has been recipient of many awards at national and international level.

S Vishwanath
Vishwanath is the Director at NIE, Mysore. He is a Secretary-General, International Rainwater Catchment Systems Association and an advisor to Argyam Foundation. He has designed and implemented several rooftop water harvesting structures in Karnataka for residences, institutions, and industries. He is a founder of the Rainwater Club, which has been disseminating information on rainwater harvesting in Bangalore since 1995. He has also worked for the report ‘Conceptual framework for rainwater harvesting for Bangalore city’.

Naresh Narasimhan
Naresh V Narasimhan is a practitioner and leader with three decades of experience in architecture and urban design. He is best known for his association with Venkataramanan Associates – an award winning architecture firm.
As co‐founder of MOD (an international collective of urban designers, researchers and curators), founder & trustee of Imagine Bangalore and founder of Cobalt (a new concept of a work and meeting space that facilitates serendipitous encounters) Naresh has fuelled a variety of progressive causes in the city.