BENGALURU: Observing that Bengaluru has to be hassle-free and needs to be brought back on track from its present derailment, the Karnataka High Court on Tuesday asked the coordination committee headed by Chief Secretary T M Vijay Bhaskar to hold a meeting on Wednesday to find practical solutions to the plethora of issues haunting the city.
The court also inducted senior advocate and former Advocate General Aditya Sondhi as the independent member to the coordination committee to report directly to the court.The court said the committee should hold a meeting once a week instead of once a fortnight to take stock of the situation and do whatever has to be done to put the city back on track.“We need broad plans to the issues which need to be addressed. We want minutes of the meeting and you make sure of every agency has to attend respective issues in all totality,” the court told the chief secretary.
There has to be a structured mechanism: HC
“Bengaluru City is growing; the metropolitan area is expanding...If the city is growing, there have to be several fundamental features. Then it is everyone’s duty to contribute,” the court said.This was a day after the court roped in the Superintending Engineer of Military Engineering Services of the Army and a judicial officer to check the potholes filled and the quality of work done.
A division bench of Chief Justice Dinesh Maheshwari and Justice S G Pandit issued this direction to Vijay Bhaskar during the hearing of a PIL filed by the Citizen Action Group in relation to storm water drains.
The court asked Bhaskar to be present in the court to make him understand several issues of the city, including potholes and quality of repair works.
“There has to be a structured mechanism. Otherwise it is uncertain. We can rely upon this committee as it is headed by the chief secretary. I am sure that Bengaluru will regain its glory...even if some are skeptical or say ‘Kuch Nahi Hoga..,” the division bench said.
When court asked what the objectives of the coordination committee are, Vijay Bhaskar explained that the committee had the heads of major departments and the agencies involved in the city’s issues as members. As of now, it had looked into unauthorised buildings, land acquisition for road widening, white topping, diversion of traffic to make way for those works, digging up roads for BWSSB works.
The court also pointed out the lack of coordination between the different city civic agencies, overlapping of agencies and that problems remained unrectified even after setting up of committee after committee by the state government.