Bengaluru Blueprint Action Group meet: Garbage, water top agenda

Bengaluru: Infrastructure, conserving water bodies, garbage disposal, drinking water and housing were some of the issues discussed at the first-ever meeting of the Bengaluru Blueprint Action Group (BBAG), chaired by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, on Tuesday.

While the group members suggested measures that could be taken up by the government, the government made a presentation to on the steps taken.
While almost all prominent members, like Biocon founder Kiran Majumdar Shaw, Wipro Chairman Azim Premji, urban experts R.K. Misra and V. Ravichandar, were present, Infosys founder N.R. Narayana Murthy, Flipkart founder Sachin Bhansal, civic expert Kalpana Kar and BPAC member Mohandas Pai gave it a miss. Nevertheless, the meeting saw the creation of multiple sub-committees across various sectors whose main focus will be executing the projects already in the pipeline.

Asked if the government could execute such a huge task within the next two years, Mr Siddaramaiah jokingly said, “If not, I will return to power and the projects will continue during my next tenure too.”

Mr Siddaramaiah said that the government will form an expert committee to expedite the projects and implement the suggestions made by the vision group. On the suggestion to trifurcate the BBMP, Mr Siddaramaiah said that the recommendation by the committee took too many political turns and he would see what could be done in the future.

“Now, the Union government has given the approval for the Suburban Railway Project. Even a DPR for the Peripheral Ring Road is being prepared. The project will cost around Rs 11,980 crore. The road construction is only Rs 3,000 crore, but land acquisition will cost Rs 8,000 crore. JICA will fund road construction. The government has requested the Centre to include it under highways,” he said.

The other projects underway include elevated corridor between Basaveshwara Circle and Hebbal flyover to connect the airport signal free corridor at a cost of Rs 1,350 crore. The North-South and East-West corridor will cost another Rs 18,000 crore. This would be constructed under the PPP model, he said.

The state government, meanwhile, has identified 4,200 acres of encroachment on lakebeds and notices have been issued for evicting encroachers. However, the layouts developed by the BDA will be exempted from demolition, he said.

The Bengaluru Metropolitan Planning Committee will meet in the first week of June and suggestions of the Vision Group will be placed before the meeting. Both the Vision Group and Metropolitan Planning Committee will meet once in three months to review the progress of projects, he said.