Mysuru/ Bengaluru: City’s well-known artist Badal Nanjundaswamy is an artist with a difference. He has now made Bengaluru his home. He attracts attention to the woes of the people through his innovative ideas. Bengaluru, which was once called the Garden City, has now become the Garbage City and of late, is also called the Potholed City, what with the potholes claiming lives.

In order to highlight this major issue, Nanjundaswamy painted a pothole-filled road at the Kamaraj Road-Cubbon Road junction, in blue colour. Then he asked his friend actor Sonu Gowda to pose as a Mermaid sitting on the footpath, yesterday.

Speaking to Star of Mysore this morning, Badal said: “People on two-wheelers fall down trying to avoid potholes and lose their lives. In Bengaluru, this has become a serious problem as the number of potholes has increased after heavy rains in the recent times. Hence, I decided to paint the spot so that the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) officials will wake up and do something about it.”

The authorities did spring to action and covered the pothole yesterday itself after I painted it and the media exposed it, he said.

“Earlier, I had painted a road with pothole titled Frog and the Princess with Sonu Gowda as the model. Even then the BBMP had acted fast and covered the pothole,” he said.

Badal Nanjundaswamy also has plans to highlight the problems of water logging and flooding of a few areas following heavy rains in Mysuru, during his next visit to the city.

“I am worried that Mysuru will also go the Bengaluru way if the citizens and the officials do not wake up and take measures right now to protect the Heritage City,” he said.