BENGALURU: Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) chief commissioner Gaurav Gupta on Sunday came under intense fire from city public representatives and the state government for delay in completing the filling of potholes and re-laying of bad road stretches, which were damaged due to the unseasonal rains in November.
In fact, a deadline of 15 days has been issued by chief minister Basvaraj Bommai to complete the pothole filling exercise and re-laying of bad roads, failing which action will be initiated against the public servant.
Revenue minister R Ashoka, who briefed the media after the meeting, said the CM has set the deadline of 15 days to complete the pothole filling and re-laying of bad roads damaged due to rains along the pending 751 kilometers of stretch in the city.
“If the deadline is not met then the government will take action against the commissioner,” said Ashoka.
According to members who attended the meeting, the bigger issue was that of lack of coordination between civic agencies as most of them dig up the roads at their available time and freshly laid stretches are destroyed indiscriminately.
For this purpose, the CM has also directed urban development department (UDD) additional chief secretary Rakesh Singh to put together a new co-ordination committee involving the civic agencies of the city.
The co-ordination committee is likely to be headed by chief minister Basavaraj Bommai and have top bosses of the city agencies as members.
“In the absence of the CM, he will nominate a person to head the committee and officiate the proceedings. Henceforth, all road cutting projects will have to be cleared at the committee before it is taken up,” said the revenue minister.
Earlier, Ashoka said CM Bommai has sanctioned Rs 1,500 crore for the construction, rectification, rebuilding and cleaning of stormwater drains (SWD) and that a separate substantial allocation will be made to a new scheme called the Amrutha Nagarothana scheme for Bengaluru.
“The decision on this new scheme will be taken up at the next cabinet meeting scheduled for Thursday,” added Ashoka.
He said the government has also asked the ongoing white topping projects to be completed by March 2022.
BJP MLAs demand additional funds
The BJP legislators and minister from Bengaluru on Sunday urged the chief minister Basavaraj Bommai to release additional funds for constituency development ahead of the BBMP polls, likely to be scheduled in March-April of this year.
According to legislators who attended the meeting, the CM was quite positive in his response but said the request will be considered later.
“He asked us to wait for the time being and assured that he will look into it,” said a city MLA.
Akrama-Sakrama on the cards: Ashoka
Revenue minister R Ashoka on Sunday said chief minister Basavaraj Bommai has been impressed upon by city MLAs and MPs to get the stay on Akrama-Sakrama vacated in the Supreme Court.
“Accordingly, along with our union IT-BT minister Rajeev Chandrasekar, the chief minister will hold a meeting with the advocate general and look at the best possible solution to ensure that this problem of A and B Khata is resolved by paying a penalty to regularise the homes constructed on revenue land,” said Ashoka.
