Inside Bengaluru’s Bowring Institute: Suspensions, court battles, and a revolt over a land deal

“They have gone to the extent of maligning us personally. They will not go scot-free,” thundered Srikanth HS, honorary secretary of the Bowring Institute in Bengaluru, at a tense general body meeting in June 2025.

Club members had learnt three months earlier that an advance of Rs 10 crore had been paid to build a second unit of the club, 100 kms away. Many among the 300-odd members who gathered that day demanded answers: Who took this decision? Why had money already been handed over to a builder? 

Srikanth’s combative 59-minute speech was a mark of the hostilities playing out within the 157-year-old institution that counts Bengaluru’s elite among its members.

The fallout from the meeting was almost immediate. Club president Bhaskar S resigned, only to be accused by Srikanth (and the management committee) soon after of engaging in “anti-club activities” and was suspended. Thirteen other members received show cause notices, and three petitions were filed in court challenging Srikanth’s actions.

The Bowring Institute was founded in 1868 as a scientific and literary institute. Two decades later, the institute was granted prime land in the heart of Bengaluru, in the area known as St Mark’s Road. The club quickly became one of the city's most sought-after and elite social centres, counting top business people, politicians, bureaucrats, and judges—essentially, the who's who of the city, among its members.

According to several members TNM spoke to, the first mention of a “second unit” came during an open house (a meeting of members) on March 23, 2025. 

That day, Srikanth made a video presentation of a 23-acre plot in Paragodu village, off the Bengaluru–Hyderabad National Highway. The land, costing Rs 87 crore, is mostly owned by Trishul Buildtech & Infrastructures Pvt Ltd, and was billed as the perfect site for the club’s expansion. 

Trishul Buildtech is a subsidiary of the MRG Group, owned by Korangrapady Prakash Shetty, a businessman who was among the three candidates shortlisted by the BJP’s core committee for a Rajya Sabha seat in 2020.  

TNM spoke to several members of the club (all of whom preferred to remain anonymous) and Srikanth about the allegations and court cases. Srikanth staunchly maintains that the decision to build a second unit at Paragodu was taken as it was the ‘most suitable land’. 

Members unaware of transaction

Ever since the open house at the club, there has been a flood of allegations. One of the main allegations made by five club members – Bharath Poovaiah, Devanandan Ramanna, Arjun Sampath Kumar, Satish J and Vivekanand MR – who approached the Karnataka city civil court is that two bankers cheques worth a total of Rs 10 crore had already been drawn in favour of the vendors on March 17. That is, six days before the open house.