Govt gives BBMP Rs 350 cr to flood-proof Bengaluru

The Karnataka government has acted at lightning speed to sanction Rs 350 crore to the BBMP for carrying out works to flood-proof Bengaluru. The Urban Development Department sanctioned the funds on Sept 28, just 10 days after the civic body made a request.

A chunk (Rs 317 crore) of this will be spent on restoring the missing links between the city’s lake network. Once known as the city of a thousand lakes, Bengaluru has witnessed urban flooding in recent years. This is mainly due to encroachments on lakes and stormwater drains that connect them. Mahadevapura, the Assembly constituency worst hit by flooding, has received Rs 160 crore.

KR Puram will get Rs 40 crore, Bommanahall Rs 65 crore, Yelahanka Rs 10 crore, Byatarayanapura Rs 10 crore and Bangalore South Rs 27.25 crore.

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The remaining Rs 33 crore will be spent on building sluice gates in 148 lakes across Bengaluru.

A sluice gate is a barrier that controls the flow of water.

While sanctioning the funds, the UDD noted that all the works should be carried out as per the Karnataka Transparency in Public Procurements Act. It also directed the BBMP to conduct a third-party audit once the works are completed to assess their quality. No work shall be packaged under Rs 10 crore while inviting tenders, the order states.

DH has seen a copy of the order.

A large number of works proposed in the Mahadevapura constituency are in places where the BBMP is currently removing encroachments from stormwater drains.

The grants would help the civic body build concrete drains by clearing encroachments at places such as RMZ Ecospace tech park, Halayanayakanahalli, Borewell Road in Whitefield, Belathur, Basavanagar, Sai Garden in KR Puram, Shantiniketan Layout in Arekere, etc, which were marooned during the recent rains.

In addition to Rs 313 crore, the BBMP has already received Rs 1,500 crore under the chief minister’s Nava Nagarothana programme. Its stormwater drain department is in the process of starting the work, which would involve constructing 150 km of concrete drains. Once this is done, 550 km of the city’s 850-km-long stormwater drain would be concretised. About 400 km of the drain network was previously concretised.

While the drain concretisation project is expected to prevent encroachments and ensure a steady water flow, it has its flip sides. Since the water velocity would be faster, it may badly affect areas lying downstream where the drains are not concretised.