JOIN USIn an election year, one reads the State Budget for signals of an intent. At an overall level, the emphasis on the farm sector, women and job creation are necessary and welcome.
Bengaluru, in particular too had a good Friday – first, the Cauvery award for more water to the 'global' city and then the State Budget with an additional provision of Rs 2,500 crores over and above the Rs 7300 crores given last year. Unfortunately, the State budget reels off a set of project initiatives instead of focusing on goals and key routes to achieve them. So, one needs to deconstruct it to understand the underlying objectives it seeks to meet.
A first step is to understand the implementation efficiency of the past allocation of Rs 7300 crores for Bengaluru. The Action Taken Report sets out the steps taken but is silent on how much has been completed.
Going by the construction on our streets, there is a lot of work happening but given tender processes and the on-ground challenges, the results will take time to become visible.
The implementation of the Indira canteen (should have been named Indira Priya Darshini!) has been a stand out success from the last year's budget.
The fresh allocation of Rs 2500 crores are focused on roads (more white topping, grade separators; 100 kms of roads and finally addressing the 110 village roads added in 2007), environment (150 kms storm water drains, 40 lakes, Rs 50 crores for Bellandur), mobility (250 kms footpath improvement, suburban rail, phase 3 Metro), 5 multi-storeyed parking (which has a poor past track record in implementation) and allocations for the Smart city SPV. It was interesting to note the increase in ITPL access through 14 roads. That is welcome and the solution to Whitefield, ORR is retro-fitting the missing street grid. Over the last two budgets, 450 kms of pedestrianisation is targeted which is badly needed – it is important that this must lead to wider footpaths.
The over emphasis on one lake in Bellandur could have been avoided. The signalling should have been an integrated watershed management across upper and lower lakes. There is a mention of Waste to Energy projects for solid waste. It would be prudent to prove the concept with a pilot project before scaling up.
The Government needs to plug away on segregation and local processing. There is mention of GIS and geo-tagging of public assets. This needs to be put out in the public domain.
There have been many welcome signals in the budget. A Pournakarmika taking place at the high table of the BBMP council is great.
(The writer is a civic evangelist)