Bengaluru flex menace: Posters, banners thrive despite BBMP’s efforts

The civic body has already taken down around 21,000 flexes, banners/hoardings within city limits since August 1.

Several localities in the city continue to be plagued by flex menace even after High Court order | Shriram BN

BENGALURU: A week after the Karnataka High Court gave the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) a seven-day deadline to remove illegal flexes, banners and hoardings across the city, it seems like the civic agency's best efforts continued to evade complete success.

Several localities in the city continued to be plagued by the menace of banners and hoardings even after the court's order. The civic body has already taken down around 21,000 flexes, banners/hoardings within city limits since August 1. While the High Court direction was about “removal”, the BBMP was quite helpless in completely removing many posters that were pasted on the walls in underpasses.

A BBMP official said, “Fast glue used to stick such posters made it extremely difficult for our men to completely remove them. In the process, despite our efforts, parts of paper remained on the walls, making it uglier than before.”

Also, after the demise of former Tamil Nadu chief minister M Karunanidhi in Chennai on Tuesday, the BBMP had issued an order to its officials to stop anybody from putting up hoardings or banners in memory of the departed DMK chief. But several hoardings of Karunanidhi were seen in Okalipuram, Malleshwaram and Srirampurm.

A decision on BBMP's action against the alleged illegal hoardings is yet to arrive as the High Court postponed the hearing to Friday.

Ban Could Affect Livelihood

The digital printing unit owners in the city shared their disappointment with the decision to ban banners and hoardings. “This sudden decision will affect lakhs of workers who are employed in over 900 printing and hoarding manufacturing units. The BBMP has delayed the implementation of advertisement laws and this is the reason so many private ad firms are coming up with hoardings in Bengaluru,” one of them said. Moreover, flexes, banners and hoardings has been part of the Bengaluru streets for many years now.

A decision on the fate of these printers and manufacturers is yet to be taken. Meanwhile, earlier this week, the BBMP commissioner had hinted that to implement the ban completely, the authorities were also planning to cancel the licences of traders who use or promote flexes, banners and hoardings.