Mpc

Hon’ble Chief Minister Govt. of Karnataka Vidhana Soudha Bangalore 560001 Dear Sir, Current situation of Bengaluru Bengaluru city has reached a population of 1 crore already.  It is finding it difficult to provide drinking water to half its residents.  The city has 60 lakh vehicles (a vehicle for every two persons), congesting roads and making it impossible for buses to ply and for pedestrians, street vendors and cyclists to have an equitable amount of road-space. Garbage mismanagement in the city has necessitated the intervention of the Karnataka High Court to ensure that MoEF Rules are followed and mafias controlled.  Lakes…

With the kick off of the year 2017, the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) put up a 35-page brochure [1] highlighting its plans for preparation for Revised Master Plan 2031 of Bengaluru city. The brochure is divided into 10 parts, including legal provisions, population projections, rationalization of jurisdictions of planning district and transport sectors, water and waste water, solid waste management, and power supply projections. As per the revision process of the Master Plan, the Revised Master Plan 2031 is the fourth revision following those made in 1984, 1995, and 2007. Citizens of Bangalore are confronted with plans on the future…

Pic: A file pic from BBMP 2010 candidates debate. It is that time again when everyone wants to make an informed choice, ahead of BBMP elections. Resident Welfare Associations are busy trying to organise meetups with candidates. Citizen Matters has compiled a guide on how to do this, with a set of questions that can be asked with a candidate. The first step is to collect information about candidates. We need your help to gather information about them and share it with us, to benefit fellow Bengalureans. You could ask them to fill this form. Alternatively, you can also gather the points…

A press note from Environment Support Group (ESG) calls out citizens to ask Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) not to plan Bengaluru, in the wake of BDA notification of public hearing related to Revised Master Plan - 2031.   This small advertisement of extraordinary significance appeared in the papers a couple of weeks ago. It does not say much. Notice that no document or map is made available as a basis for debate and feedback. And if you review the BDA website, all you find about the 2031 Master plan is the minutes of a meeting soliciting consultants to prepare the…

In the recent past, there have been quite a few instances where the courts have intervened with respect to civic projects. The recent one was when the Karnataka High Court directed civic agencies to widen the Hulimavu-Begur road- a case where the BBMP and a real estate company were at loggerheads. In another case, the Karnataka High Court directed the BBMP to get rid of encroachments on footpaths – this order was passed in response to a petition filed by an individual to make footpaths accessible to pedestrians. Yet another case was when the High Court ruled mixed land use…

As many as 20 members were chosen from Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) for Bangalore Metropolitan Planning Committee (BMPC). However, newly elected Mayor Shanthakumari does not exist in the list. Former mayor B S Satyanarayana too did not make it to the premier list.Metropolitan Planning Committee is the planning body for every metropolitan area mandated by the constitution, which should have hyper-local level peoples’ representatives as its members, in addition to subject experts and executives from the government. This will plan the infrastructure requirements and land use for the city. After a High Court directive, Bangalore is now in the…

One has to be thankful that a beginning has been made to create Bangalore Metropolitan Planning Committee. But why have the MPC Rules been framed to apply only to Bangalore, while Mysore and Hubli—Dharwad are also about to cross the 10 lakh population criterion, or have already crossed it? Are the rules going to be framed for each city separately? The way the rules have been framed for the MPC’s  functioning, it will serve only two functions: 1) to comply with the High Court order to meet the letter of the law, but not its spirit; 2) to continue to…

The most common complaint Bangaloreans have about the city of Bengaluru is about the planning being a disaster. This is especially the case after Bengaluru grew out of its old city limits and ate up rural areas very quickly. All of this, coupled with reckless issue of permissions and corruption, led to disorderly growth in traffic, water usage and even hiving off of lakes for development. The term “well-planned city” is referred to in a utopian way by many. But come September 16, this is all about to change. Bangalore is one step closer to better planning and coordination between…

Panel discussion organised by CIVIC. Pic: Shree D N If what Minister for Urban Development, Karnataka, Vinay Kumar Sorake promised in a panel discussion held on July 11, 2014 materialises into concrete action, Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) corporators cannot continue to rule the roost. Citizens will get more power and say in local matters, in the form of ward committees and area sabhas. The Minister promised to amend the section 13 of Karnataka Municipal Corporation Act, to remove veto power over ward committees given to corporators. He also said he would look into amending the section to remove the…

Citizens and Resident Welfare Associations in Bengaluru have objected to the recommendations made by the Karnataka Information and Communication Technology Group Report (KIG Report) that does not address the crucial challenges faced by the citizens, especially in terms of real governance reforms and transparency. Objecting to the recommendations made in the report, the Namma Bengaluru Foundation (NBF) BRACE - a consortium of 750 Residents Association in the city said the report represents a surrender of the city's Development to the commercial interests represented by builders, contractors and real estate companies - many of whose commercial interests are directly responsible for…