dug-up bylanes

Bengaluru

Mayor of Bengaluru

Goutham Kumar Jain

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Bangalore

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Potholed roads,and now lake spills... anger is building up against mismanagement of. Can the Mayor deliver?Bengalureans are out on the streets, protesting the non-existent infrastructure in the city. Students are forced to skip school to put forth their demands. Traffic has reduced to a crawl; so much so that it is faster to walk than drive in many stretches. But then again, there’s no place to walk.Even the ardent supporters of the present dispensation are frustrated. Former Infoscian TV Mohandas Pai recently tweeted: “We are totally helpless and frustrated, govt action is pathetic, @CMofKarnataka agrees to proposals but no execution, bureaucracy helpless, Can @PMOIndia @narendramodi save Bengaluru?”Much before the 53rdwas elected from the Jogupalya ward, Shanthinagar assembly constituency, this city has been desperately seeking a (dark) knight in shining armour to rid the city of it’s Gothamesque problems. (Gotham is the fictional city in American comics created by DC Comics, which is infamous for its run-down grungy appearance, neglect, sleaze, petty thieves, rage against the establishment, and of course a pantheon of evil crime lords.) If you watched Todd Phillips’s Joker starring Joaquin Phoenix recently, you’ll see that Gotham is in the throes of a garbage workers strike. Uncanny resemblance? We think not.Much like the Gotham in Joker, the anger of Bengaluru’s citizens is raw and real. We have many Bruce Waynes (there are millionaire politicians like Rajeev Chandrasekhar and PC Mohan who are fighting criminals, lobbying for infrastructure etc) but the city has its faire share of Jokers and Harvey Two-Faces too.The newly-minted mayor says he begins the day at 6.30 am and for two hours listens to the grievances of the citizens. He says he often rides through neighbourhoods on his two-wheeler to check the state of the roads and tours the city with his team of Commissioners, engineers, special commissioners and joint commissioners.“We are looking at 10-acre lands in the outskirts of the city to set up the 2,500-tonne plant where the mixed waste would be segregated and then non-biodegradable waste would be used to convert it to energy,” he says. Construction waste and material dumped on roads is just one of the reasons that traffic has reduced to a crawl.Average peak-hour vehicle speed in the Central Business District has slowed down by 40% say Bengaluru Traffic Police. There are potholes, dug up roads everywhere, not to mention Metro work that is going on. Jain says: “We are working on it, it will take some time.”According to Srinivas Alavalli, co-founder of Citizens for Bengaluru (CfB), the only solution is decentralisation. “If all organisations starting with alphabet ‘B’ come under Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP),then there will be better planning. The agencies such asElectricity Supply Company Limited (BESCOM) and Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) do not feel a part of the BBMP,” he says.Corruption and lack of local governance are the core issues, says Sandeep Anirudhan, founder of Citizens Agenda for Bengaluru. “We have about five parastatal agencies such as BESCOM and BWSSB that run the city. They are not answerable to anyone,” he says. He adds that the organisations such as BMTC and BESCOM run only for profit. “Our bus fares are the highest in the country. They should be providing services at subsidised rates to encourage people to use public transport,” he says. The 74th amendment of the constitution has also not been implemented. “The BBMP has not been audited in several years. Transparency is zero. While a project is under construction, the authority should put up a board with details such as the approval plan, cost of the project and the contact information of the contractor,” he says.The citizens are willing to share their knowledge and participate in the civic administration. However, he says, lack of will by the governing body is standing in the way of the reform. “All the mess in the city can come to an end with citizen participation and Unified Metropolitan Transport Policy as promised in the BJP manifesto. If all modes of transportation are managed by a single authority, there will be better planning. I hope they will act on their manifesto,” says Anirudhan.Yes, there are a few silver linings. When 40% of the ward committees meet frequently. When Bengaluru MP PC Mohan pushes for transport solutions like suburban train services. When Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar says the BJP government is thinking about a separate body to revive and restore lakes. When the CM bans plastic in his office…But Bengaluru is bleeding and it needs more than a band aid. Who will be our caped crusader?