City: Bengaluru

BBMP is constructing an underpass at Sarjapura Road at Harlur Road junction, much against local residents’ objections. Despite numerous attempts to engage with BBMP, the authorities are insisting on going ahead with this project. This insistence is surprising even as BBMP itself has recently talked about rejecting underpass solutions. Announced in 2016-17, the project to construct an underpass on Sarjapura Road at Harlur Road Junction was estimated to cost Rs 23 crores. While the proposal was based on the situation back in 2016-17, the ground situation has changed now with traffic management measures being taken, as well as a post-pandemic…

Karnataka presently generates around 500 tonnes of biomedical waste per month. Over 70% of this ends up in landfills, contaminating soil, water and air. Part of this includes medicines, which has only increased with the COVID-19 pandemic. While hospitals and clinics account for the bulk generation of the waste, they are governed by the Hazardous and Biomedical Waste Management Rules 2016, set out for them. This ensures that many of them follow some basic guidelines on responsible disposal of bio-medical waste.However, at the household level, there appear to be glaring gaps in the manner in which medical waste generated is…

Bengaluru city makes up only 6% of the Arkavathy river basin area, but is a major contributor to the river's pollution. Similar is the case with Vrushabhavathi river. Wastewater from industrial areas like Peenya, along with domestic sewage, is choking these rivers. Downstream, these rivers join the Cauvery, from which water is pumped up to meet the city's needs. This effectively means that the wastewater dumped by the city comes right back to it. This was illustrated in a presentation made by Nirmala Gowda, co-founder of the paani.earth website that maps the rivers of Karnataka. Nirmala was speaking at a…

New BBMP Chief Commissioner appointed On Thursday, Tushar Giri Nath replaced Gaurav Gupta as the BBMP Chief Commissioner. Giri Nath, a 1993-batch Karnataka-cadre IAS officer, was serving as Principal Secretary in the Revenue department. Gupta will now be Additional Chief Secretary in the Infrastructure department. The state government has transferred several other IAS officers as well. Of late, BBMP has been mired in controversies related to pothole accidents, waterlogging and incomplete infrastructure projects. Source: Indian Express Govt yet to approve BBMP budget BBMP is still awaiting the state government's approval for its 2021-22 budget which has an outlay of Rs…

In July 2021, Brookefields Layout, a community East of Marathahalli in Bengaluru, finally got its roads asphalted. Within a month, BESCOM - the electric utility, informed the community that they wanted to dig a beautiful, brand-new road to lay their 11KV lines. Prior to asphalting, we had asked several utilities (including BESCOM) if they had any pending work on the road. Many took the opportunity to lay their lines; the road asphalting itself was delayed to accommodate new gas lines, optical cables, telephone cables, water lines, and more. BESCOM said they had no plans; for them to now say they…

Over the years, Bengalureans have protested against a number of infrastructure projects that they believed went against public interest. For example the protests against the proposed elevated road corridors in 2019. Or the recent protests against metro construction on All Saints' Church land. While the protests mentioned above were successful, many others were not. Citizens often are unable to get government agencies to listen to their concerns. In many cases, they become aware of the details of a project only when construction starts. But public consultations at multiple stages are mandatory for public infrastructure projects as per the Karnataka Town…

One way to be aware of issues of impropriety and poor performance in local government bodies and departments is to track the audit reports from agencies like the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG). This article is the fourth of a series by experts from Indian Accounts and Audit Service. A country’s socio-economic development is largely linked to the natural resources it possesses. With mineral resources being an important component. Karnataka has huge reserves of minerals like iron ore, limestone and gold among other natural resources, and its ranking based on mineral reserves and production capacity within India varies…

Any initiative for last-mile connectivity has to be safe, reliable and cost-effective. One of the most promising ideas to come up in recent months that satisfies these requirements is electric-autos (E-autos). Last-mile connectivity has always been an issue that all public transport entities, especially metro and bus systems, have to deal with. Bengaluru metro, for instance, with its extension to Kengeri and Anjanapura, now has a total of 51 metro stations which require last mile connectivity. An issue that will only become more widespread as the metro expands to other areas.  Bengaluru Metro Transport Corporation (BMTC), which handles the city’s…

Increased vigilance as COVID cases rise On Thursday, 142 COVID cases were reported in Bengaluru Urban out of 154 in the state, with zero deaths. The day’s TPR (Test Positivity Rate) was 1.49%, while the weekly TPR touched 1.16%. The TPR in Bengaluru has been increasing slightly since April 9th. Cases of mucormycosis or black fungus were back in at least one private hospital, Manipal Hospitals in Hebbal. This is despite the absence of risk factors such as sharing of oxygen cylinders or unhygienic treatment facilities, which were suggested as the possible causes of black fungus in the second COVID…

Rivers, the lifeline of our economy, are drying up and/or becoming too polluted. Drought and floods are becoming frequent and more intense. Addressing these challenges involves making sound data-driven and evidence based decisions in the context of the river basin. In a mature democracy, data and evidence should be in the public domain, so citizens, including policy makers, can form informed opinions and take informed actions. Once, it was the Arkavathi river that sustained Bengaluru. Running dry and polluted for almost half a century now, Arkavathi river is today biologically dead, a ghost river. It stands as living proof of…