The story so far
A month after Congress came to power in Karnataka, the State government on June 12 reconvened the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) Restructuring Committee, which the previous Congress regime (between 2013 and 2018) had formed. The newly-elected Congress government is keen on splitting the BBMP into multiple corporations for ease of administration.
The committee’s recommendation to split BBMP into multiple corporations dates back to 2015. However, it was not implemented then, as the courts asked the State government to hold civic polls immediately and there was political opposition to the move by the BJP and the JD(S), who later came to power and spiked the proposal.
Now, with the Congress gaining power back in Karnataka, the party is determined to bring back the Restructuring Committee, which according to the party, is the “best solution” to fix the city’s governance deficit.
However, with Bengaluru growing larger each year, the committee has been given a larger mandate to reimagine Bengaluru’s governance and administration. Due to the unprecedented demographic and spatial growth of Bengaluru over the last two decades, the Committee will be covering not only the BBMP, but all related civic and infrastructure departments like the Urban Development Department, the Bengaluru Development Authority (BDA), the Bangalore water supply and sewerage board (BWSSB), the Bangalore Metropolitan Region Development Authority (BMRDA), the Directorate of Urban Land Transport (DULT), the Bengaluru Metropolitan Land Transport Authority (BMLTA), the city police, the Fire and Emergency Services, the Slum Board, etc., and corporations like the Bengaluru Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC), Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Limited (Bescom), Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Limited (BMRCL), and Suburban Rail.
The committee has also been tasked with ensuring deep de-centralisation at the ward level with citizens participating and appropriate centralisation at the apex levels, while being consistent with the spirit of the 74th Amendment including the Metropolitan Planning Committee (MPC) set up.
Why restructuring?
The Expert Committee was initially constituted to suggest how the existing BBMP could be divided into smaller municipal areas. According to the State, Bengaluru had grown too large and unwieldy to be managed by a single corporation. The 2007 amalgamation of the erstwhile Bangalore Mahanagar Palike (BMP) with seven City Municipal Councils (CMC), one Town Municipal Council (TMC) and 110 villages had not yielded the expected gains. The villages added to BBMP still lacked basic amenities like underground sewerage, drainage and piped water. With multiple civic agencies operating in silos and a BBMP, the city lacked appropriate governance, administration and people capacity. To have a holistic view of what ails the current set up and civic agencies in delivering on citizen expectations, having a Restructuring Committee is seem as the solution for the State.
Head office of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike.
What is the three-tier governance framework, suggested architecture for managing Bengaluru?
The Committee recommended a holistic structure for managing Bengaluru which would be divided into three levels with the highest level being Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA), Municipal Corporation (MC)/Mayor in Council at the second level, and the third level – the Ward. The three-tier governance framework suggested would focus on providing for the Metropolitan Planning Committee (MPC) at the regional level with the Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA) as a Local Planning Authority (LPA) and strengthening the ward committees at the lowest level. The ward committee will give voice and a place for citizens to address local urban issues in their neighborhood. Each ward will have a representative ward committee with clearly defined functions. The wards will be empowered to take necessary action to fix issues faced by the locality.
The restructuring committee suggested devolution of powers to smaller governance units with a credible leader at the Municipal Corporation level, with a co-existence of larger Metropolitan governance structures while protecting the devolved powers at the lower levels.
I. Ward Committees
As per the recommendations of the 2015 report of the Committee, each Ward would have a Ward Committee comprised of 20 members, half of whom are elected on the basis of proportional representation reflecting the party vote share in the municipal elections and the other half nominated from a wide spectrum of civil society. Each Ward would have a Secretary who shall be the chief executive responsible for carrying out the decisions of the Ward Committee. Each Ward Committee shall prepare a 5-year Ward Vision Plan, an Annual Ward Development Plan and an Annual Ward Budget. Ward Committees are required to be consulted on any change in land use in the Master Plan. Ward Committees would be empowered to execute, supervise and audit the works of the Corporation in the Ward and retain a fixed share of the taxes collected from the ward for undertaking projects in the ward determined by the Ward Committee. However, it is to be seen whether the state government, especially MLAs who have a stranglehold over the city, would agree to devolve so much power to the ward committees.
II. Mayor-in-Council system for Municipal Corporations – MPC
The BBMP Restructuring Committee suggested the present Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) be divided into five coporations, with a total of 400 wards put-together. It suggested that each Municipal Corporation would have a Mayor-in-Council, consisting of the Mayor, Deputy Mayor and 10 other members. The Mayor-in-Council, instead of the Commissioner, is vested with executive powers of the Corporation and shall be collectively responsible to the Corporation. Each Municipal Corporations will have a Municipal Accounts Committee to scrutinize the accounts and expenditure of the Municipal Corporation.
Municipal Corporations may also constitute Subject Committees to review and monitor the functioning of the Corporation on subjects such as urban planning, public health and waste management. Municipal Corporation are to be divided into zones with each zone having a Zonal Committee consisting of all the councillors elected from the wards within that Zone. The Zonal Committee can supervise the activities of the Corporation carried out across multiple wards within the Zone, the report recommended.
III. Greater Bengaluru Authority – GBA
The Greater Bengaluru Authority (GBA), which will be the pan-city body to integrate the goverance of multiple corporations and several parastatals, should be headed by the chief minister and in the next ten years should transition to be headed by a directly elected mayor for the city, the BBMP Restructuring Committee recommended. The Report said that the GBA must include Commissioner of BDA, Mayors and two other councillors from all Municipal Corporations, one MLA from each Municipal Corporation, two members representing the Panchayats, the executive heads of BWSSB, BMTC, BMRCL and BESCOM, and five experts in matters related to urban governance nominated by the government. It suggested that the BDA should be the Secretariat of the GBA and the Commissioner of BDA will be the Member Secretary of GBA. The GBA should have the powers to supervise and issue directions to BWSSB, BDA, BMTC, BMRCL, BESCOM and any other agency discharging municipal functions in the Bengaluru as notified by the government, it recommended.
How long will it take for the State to implement the Restructuring Committee?
The Congress party had made a promise in their manifesto to introduce a new law for city governance, which would establish a single agency responsible for overseeing all the city’s parastatals. This law is intended to replace the current BBMP Act of 2020 implemented by the BJP government.
It was feared that like in 2015, the courts may insist on holding civic polls immediately and this will derail the reform process. However, the Karnataka High Court has now provided 12 weeks time for the State government to re-do the delimitation process, which has breathed a fresh lease of life for the BBMP Restructuring Committee as well. Sources said the government was keen to introduce a new bill to replace the existing BBMP Act, 2020 within the three month period to implement its governance reforms for the city, including splitting BBMP.