Restructuring of Bengaluru: Azim Premji University to help draft bill

BENGALURU: The committee on restructuring of Bengaluru is involved in drafting a separate Act and rules and regulations for the governance and holistic growth of a restructured city. The Act will be formulated with the support of faculty from the Azim Premji University. Faculty members, Sudhir Krishnaswamy, Alex M. Thomas and Mathew Idiculla, will give their inputs to the draft proposal.

Committee sources said that Bengaluru definitely needs a separate act like other developed cities across the world. “Bengaluru cannot be governed by the Karnataka Municipal Corporation Act. The new Act will take points from the KMC Act, but will stitch it to address the complexities of the city,” they said.

The committee has suggested that the Metropolitan Planning Committee should not restrict its role only to Bengaluru, but scale up to encompass areas under the Bengaluru Metropolitan Region Development Authority, which include Devanahalli, Magadi, Nelamanagala and Hoskote taluks.

The new Act will focus on all areas of administration and define the delimitation of wards and number of voters in each ward, and the role of mayors, deputy mayors and commissioners.

The BBMP has not been able to overcome its fiscal crisis and improve its property tax collection. Though the BBMP has taken up the Geographical Information System-based system, the collection is just over 60 per cent.