If you are passing by Lavelle Road in Bengaluru, make sure you get a glimpse of BBMP Biscuits. This is the latest handiwork of Baadal Nanjundaswamy, a city-based street artist who is known for drawing attention to civic issues through his artwork.
The latest artwork comes a week after another installation on a road in Sultanpalya, in which Baadal highlighted potholes on the road with the caption "#10 Year Challenge."
Tobbmpwithlove! #10YearChallenge #potholes #sultanpalya #nammabengaluru #bbmp pic.twitter.com/kHP1n319tV
— baadal nanjundaswamy (@baadalvirus) January 29, 2019
Baadal, however, refuses to explain the meaning of his artwork. "The artwork is my message. The language is visual and it is the language I know. I don't explain the meaning of it," he said in an interview with TNM.
He revealed that both artworks were completed overnight. "People are very friendly here. In fact, some people thought I was from the BBMP and that I was marking the potholes for fixing them," he added.
With his latest art installation, many believe that Baadal is looking to highlight the uneven nature of manholes in Bengaluru and how they lead to poor road conditions.
Baadal hails from Mysuru and graduated from Chamarajendra Academy of Visual Arts (CAVA). In the past, the artist has turned a pothole in Mysuru into a menacing dengue mosquito, a pothole in Bengaluru into a fearsome crocodile and another into a rakshasa, and even Joker from the Batman series.
He has also transformed a pothole on Kamaraj Road into a blue pond with a mermaid sitting inside it.
The Karnataka High Court has repeatedly asked the BBMP to make Bengaluru pothole-free over the last six months, but the city's roads continue to be riddled with small craters.
The city’s manholes have another dangerous link: Manual scavenging in Bengaluru manholes have led to the deaths of more than 75 persons in the last 10 years.