The Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) council that met on Monday squarely placed the blame for the havoc caused by rain in the city last week on bureaucracy.
Councillors said that the public and the media were unduly critical of councillors, while the bureaucracy got away scot-free. One of the councillors blamed citizens for building houses without formal sanction in low-lying areas.
Councillors objected to the “shoddy work” done by the Storm Water Drain division of the BBMP, which they alleged was the chief culprit in the flooding of the city. H.C. Ananthaswamy, chief engineer, Storm Water Drain (SWD) division, was called to the council and reprimanded. The former Deputy Mayor S. Harish alleged that a bill of Rs. 8 crore had been cleared without bringing it to the notice of the council or any standing committee. Mr. Ananthaswamy said that the project was broken down into 43 works and desilting of SWDs at 65 locations was taken up through e-tendering process.
Leader of Opposition in the Council, B.N. Manjunath Reddy, demanded an inquiry into the repeated flooding of Kino Theatre junction and Gali Anjaneya Temple, in spite of spending several crores to prevent flooding.
Commissioner M. Lakshminarayan acknowledged that the flooding in Anepalya and Neelasandra was a man-made disaster, as the flood was caused due to a temporary bridge built across the SWD using cement pipes. He said the bridge was built under wardwise works and immediate action was taken to build a metal bridge to prevent further flooding. Councillors demanded that officials who bungled up the project be suspended immediately.
Councillors also demanded that the compensation for houses flooded by rain water be raised to at least Rs. 5,000 from the present Rs. 2,000.
