Dweep Tulika

  From exposing broken roads and civic failures to facing criminal allegations over social-media posts, Pandit's arrest has raised questions about free expression, police procedure and the limits of online criticism Pune: For years, Santosh Gajanan Pandit built his public identity around a deceptively simple idea: point a camera at problems that citizens had learned to live with. A pothole. A damaged road. A broken drain. An alleged traffic violation. A civic project he believed had been poorly executed. Pandit recorded them, confronted officials and public representatives, posted the encounters online and, in some cases, returned repeatedly until the issue received attention. His approach turned ordinary civic complaints into highly visible social-media content. Now, the 48-year-old Pune activist and content creator is in judicial custody in connection with cases concerning allegedly obscene, sexually suggestive, abusive and defamatory content posted online. A Pune court re...

Residents say household waste is not consistently collected from doorsteps and seek clarity on the service attached to the municipal user fee Sri Vijaya Puram, September 11, 2026: Residents of South Point have raised questions over the collection of a ₹250 household waste-management charge for five months , particularly regarding the manner in which garbage collection is being carried out in parts of the locality. A digital payment receipt shared with Dweep Tulika shows a payment of ₹250 to the Municipal Council on September 11, 2026 . Residents describe the payment as a charge associated with household waste collection, which works out to ₹50 per month . While user fees form part of the solid-waste management framework, residents are questioning whether the service being delivered corresponds with what they understand as door-to-door garbage collection. The Solid Waste Management Rules provide for user fees as specified in local-body bye-laws and also provide for door-to-door coll...