The High Court of Karnataka on Thursday directed the secretaries of Karnataka State Legal Services Authority (KSLSA) and Bengaluru Urban District Legal Services Authority to set up teams to inspect the condition of roads in the city and submit a report by February 5.
The court directed them to identify roads for inspection and depute paralegal volunteers and advocates on the legal aid panel of KSLSA to conduct the inspection and take photographs. Paralegal volunteers are volunteers chosen from different walks of life and imparted with legal training by the legal services authorities.
A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice S. Vishwajith Shetty issued the directions while hearing some PIL petitions filed in the court since 2015 complaining of the poor state of roads and the failure of civic authorities to maintain them properly.
Both the secretaries have been directed to also hold a meeting with the petitioners and their advocates to identify roads for inspection.
The order was issued after it was pointed out by the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) counsel that the civic body did not appoint Indian Institute of Science (IISc) to conduct an audit on repair works on the city’s streets as the IISc had submitted a proposal stating that the audit would cost ₹5.4 crore.
The court had, on February 6 this year, directed the BBMP to entrust the task of auditing road repair work to the IISc to ascertain whether the work on repairing/refilling potholes was being done scientifically and whether the streets were in reasonably good condition.
