When Bengaluru erupted over a 4-anna tax on cycles

Former legislative assembly speaker K R Ramesh Kumar recalled the Bengaluru of the early 1960s when the government's decision to levy a four-anna tax on cycles parked in public areas brewed a massive civic movement.

"This was 1963-64 and I was a high school student. This tax on cycles became a huge movement," he said while speaking about price rise in the assembly on Thursday. "In 1980, during my first term as an MLA, patients in the OPD at government hospitals had to pay four annas to get their slip. This was hiked to Re 1. There was an uproar in the assembly and the price was reduced to eight annas," he recollected.

He added: "The rise in prices is happening daily. Collectively, we have committed this crime. We are the price rise culprits? What is the rise in our price? What was the price for us to get here? What's the price that got fixed once we're here?"