The first step to realising a longstanding demand for a functional Bengaluru Metropolitan Planning Committee (BMPC) was taken on Wednesday with the election of 18 councillors from Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) as members.
The last time councillors were elected to the BMPC was just over six months before the term of the last BBMP council came to an end in April 2015, rendering it a non-starter. The BMPC, chaired by Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, is yet to have its maiden meeting.
However, there is a lot riding on the current BMPC, as it will have a longer tenure of four-and-a-half years till August 2020, co-terminus with the term of the present BBMP council.
But with Bengaluru Development Minister K.J. George spearheading the State government's development agenda for the city, most civic activists are worried about the autonomy that BMPC will enjoy.
“The minister has been announcing ill-conceived mega projects, including a network of tunnels and elevated corridors. Will the BBMP councillors now elected to the BMPC correct this? This question makes us pessimistic about the whole exercise,” said N.S. Mukunda of Citizens’ Action Forum (CAF).
Master Plan
Ideally, BMPC will have to now take over the larger planning of the city, including the Revised Master Plan 2031, that the Bangalore Development Authority (BDA) is engaged in.
BDA Commissioner T. Sham Bhatt, who is member-secretary of BMPC, said that BDA, being the Local Planning Authority (LPA), has the mandate to prepare the master plan. “But we will be submitting RMP 2031 to the BMPC for approval,” he said.
However, civic activists have been resisting this approach from day one. A public hearing conducted by the BDA for the master plan last year ended up being a stormy affair, with activists questioning the locus standi of BDA to go ahead with the process.
The activists have been arguing that the Master Plan, a blueprint for the city's development over the next 15 years, cannot be drawn up by bureaucrats without the involvement of elected representatives.
