What has come under severe criticism during the recent encroachment clearance drive is the fact that the civic body has not made public the list of encroachments on rajakaluves.
A survey by the Revenue Department has identified 1,923 encroachments of which BBMP claimed to have cleared over 900. However, officials were unwilling to disclose which properties would be demolished even a day before the drive fearing that property owners will move court.
This has been criticised by activists who argue that this is denial of the right of citizens to seek legal reprieve. “Though we are not against clearing encroachments, it has to be done democratically . The BBMP is carrying out the drive in an opaque manner. There are allegations that they are selectively demolishing encroachments. Since the list of encroachers is not in the public domain, we can’t crosscheck,” said Kshitij Urs, of Peoples Campaign for Right to Water.
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Mayor B.N. Manjunath Reddy said that the list was not made public as a precautionary measure to prevent any obstacle. “We are considering uploading the list of encroachments on our website next week,” he said.