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An evening with Honorable Ministers, Senior Government Officials and Citizens of Bangalore
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We had a very successful evening at the ITC Gardenia that brought together various elected representatives, government officials and citizens under one roof.
The ‘Agenda for Bangalore’ was discussed and deliberated upon on June 8 at a high-powered event at the ITC Gardenia. The event brought together government officials, members of the judiciary, the police and concerned citizens of Bangalore. Eminent personalities
addressed the audience, and there were two panel discussions that touched upon the problems and potential solutions facing Bangalore.
Ms. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, President, B.PAC, welcomed the panelists and urged the citizens to take a more active part in the city’s governance. Justice M N Venkatachaliah reminded the gathering about citizens’ responsibility in a democracy. This was followed
by the first panel discussion with elected representatives on “Agenda for a Better Bangalore”. Ms. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Mr. T.V.Mohandas Pai, Vice President, B.PAC, and Mr. Prakash Belawadi, Member, B.PAC, moderated the discussion with eminent panelists that
included Mr. Ramalinga Reddy, Transport Minister, Government of Karnataka, Mr. Dinesh Gundu Rao, Minister of State - Food, Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs, Government of Karnataka and Mr. Krishna Byregowda, Minister of State – Agriculture, Government of
Karnataka
 Talk by Dr. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw
Talk by Justice M N Venkatachaliah
Speaking on the traffic situation in the city, Mr. Ramalinga Reddy mentioned that the unprecedented growth of Bangalore city had resulted in an increase in the number of vehicles plying on the road to over 40 lakhs, making it amongst the highest in the country.
The government was planning to improve the situation with the construction of more flyovers and better public transport. He promised to engage with B.PAC and other civic groups to find solutions. Mr. Krishna Byregowda asked for greater engagement by RWAs and
other citizen groups to find solutions to civic problems, and urged the BBMP to be open to involving experts from outside in various areas like urban planning, traffic management, waste management, etc. Elaborating on the garbage issue, he said that about
4000 MT of garbage was generated by the city every day and that the issue could only be managed with public co-operation.
The second panel discussion was also moderated by Ms. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, Mr. T.V.Mohandas Pai, and Mr. Prakash Belawadi, and the panel included senior government
officials Mr. M. R. Srinivasmurthy, Chairman, KERC, Mr. N. Shivasailam, Managing Director, BMRCL, Mr. N. Laxmi Narayan, Commissioner, BBMP, Mr. M.A. Saleem, Additional Commissioner of Police (Traffic), Bangalore City and Mr. Anjum Parwez, Managing Director,
BMTC.
Panel Discussion 1 Panel
Discussion 2
Mr. Mohandas Pai urged citizens to join hands with BBMP to clean up the city over the next two months. N Shivasailam, MD, BMRCL, shared the progress of the 2nd phase of the metro and urged people to have faith in the project manager and cooperate to ensure
timely completion. He informed the audience that once the third phase of the metro project was implemented, the metro network of Bangalore would measure 250 km.
Mr. Anjum Parwez, MD,BMTC, pointed out that the public transport system was envisioned to be a service and not a commercial activity, and had to be subsidised for the poor. BBMP Commissioner, Mr. N Laxmi Narayan highlighted that despite being short-staffed,
the staff was working round the clock to restore normalcy post heavy rains and that mechanised desilting of drains was underway He also shared that the call centre staff strength was being enhanced to offer 24x7 support to citizens.
Mr. M A Saleem, ACP Traffic, discussed the challenges of Bangalore traffic and agreed to one way traffic movement and synchronized signals in five corridors as one of the measures of decongestion.
Speaking about the power situation, Mr. M. R. Srinivasmurthy, Chairman, KERC, asserted that the power situation in Karnataka was much better than the neighboring states. He said that there was a shortage of 30% of which 17% was met by borrowed power. He stressed
on the need to plan for the future and added that Karnataka had the maximum proportion of green power from renewable resources like hydel and wind power.
The event also saw Mr. C.N. Ashwathnarayan, MLA, Malleshwaram, Mr. N.N. VijayaKumar, MLA, Jayanagar, Mr. N. A Harris, MLA Shanthinagar, Dr. Tejaswini Gowda, INC, Dr. MRV Prasad, JD-S, Mr. Abdul Azeem, JD-S, Mr. Michael B Fernandes, KJP, Ms. Shantala Damle,
LSP, Ms. Meenakshi Bharat, LSP being felicitated.
Justice Santosh Hegde addressed the gathering on the topic of creating good governance in Karnataka, and the evening ended with a vote of thanks by Nooraine Fazal.
Talk by Justice Santosh Hegde
Vote of Thanks
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Conversations with MLAs at B.PAC Office
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During the month of June, B.PAC had two MLA visits where each of them shared their assessment of the key priorities for the city and for their respective constituencies with members and RWA representatives.
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Mr. B.N.Vijayakumar, MLA, Jayanagar Constituency
Mr. B.N.Vijayakumar spoke to members about the city’s crying need for a grand and futuristic vision, need for a realistic and achievable budget,
the acute shortage of manpower at BBMP and its inability to keep pace with the city’s rapid growth, increasing population and large administrative area. He also mentioned the need for citizens to put pressure on BBMP for better service. When members suggested
implementation of the Dr.K.Kasturirangan committee report on BBMP, he candidly agreed that the political leadership had failed to bring the recommendations. The projects that were discussed at the meeting included:
• Education/ Skill development initiatives in a learning center in Jayanagar
• Working to implement Kasa Muktha in Jayanagar constituency
• Support to the Voter Registration, Voter List Cleaning and Restoration drive
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Mr. N. A Harris, MLA, Shanthinagar Constituency
In an interaction with BPAC members, Mr. N A Harris shared his vision for the constituency. At the meeting, Mr. Harris and BPAC agreed to jointly explore various initiatives
in the constituency. The projects that were discussed at the meeting included:
• Creating a model blueprint for Civic Infrastructure (Roads, Access, Water, Power etc.) for Richmond town.
• Education initiatives in a school in Shantinagar on a pilot basis as a model for partnership.
• Working to implement Kasa Muktha in Shantinagar constituency
• Support to the Voter Registration, Voter List Cleaning and Restoration drive
• Working to make Bangalore a "Safe City" and avail funds from the Centre for the same as it becomes available
• Supporting the drive to keep the city clean from posters on the walls
• Working towards segregating the planning and execution functions for civic infrastructure development so that planning function gets the right focus and facilitates a well-thought-out master plan for the city
• Working towards splitting BBMP into two or more BBMP-like organisations to make it more manageable and responsive to the citizen's needs. In the coming weeks we will continue our conversations with other MLAs and firm up action plans .
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B.PAC to Establish ‘Bangalore Civic Leadership Incubator’ – BCLI
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Creating Transformational Leadership through a Civic Leadership Incubator
• Bangalore City faces increasingly complex civic issues that require greater civic engagement and innovative solutions. The pressure on traditional institutions - government, business and nonprofit - to meet the challenges of rapid urbanisation is immense
and there is a crying need for active citizen engagement in problem-solving.
• Big advances in society have always been powered by people. We require breakthrough ideas that are scalable, leverage technology and engage people in new and different
ways. The B.PAC Civic Leadership Incubator seeks to inspire, equip and mobilise aspiring citizens to contest for city council elections and help govern Bangalore. It will partner with other institutions for curriculum development and delivery.
• The program will include education on civic issues, branding, campaign finance, communication strategy, etc., along with mentoring and networking with a view to
creating a new cadre of elected leaders who will successfully drive and scale civic initiatives at the grassroots and create transformative change in our communities through good governance.
• The B.PAC Core Committee, at a meeting chaired by Ms. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, President, B.PAC, discussed the first draft presentation on ‘Bangalore Civic Leadership
Incubator’ (BCLI). This will be a key activity for B.PAC in the coming months.
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Citizen and Youth Outreach
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In our effort to create meaningful conversations with citizen groups and youth, we have had the Koramangala Residents’ Welfare Association and India Forward (a student NGO incubated at Aditi) present their activities to B.PAC.
Koramangala Infrastructure Task Force Presents Proposal for Hosur Road
Maj. P Kapur, Nitin Seshadri and Vijayan Menon from Koramangala Infrastructure Task Force have filed a PIL in the high court and won the case against creating an underpass near St. Johns Hospital,
deeming the project unscientific.The Koramangala Infrastructure Task Force shared a detailed presentation on their alternative proposal for easing traffic congestion in and around Koramangala / Hosur Road junction with B.PAC members. Following the meeting,
B.PAC has written to the authorities to create and follow Area Development Plan to help solve the traffic problem in the city.
India Forward Presents Youth Initiative for Bringing Change
A group of 13 school students registered the first NGO run by students in India, and were invited to present their case to B.PAC members. Arjun Bir, Varun Sreedhar and Sanjuktha Mohan from
the India Forward team shared their experiences of running the NGO which works towards providing elementary education to underprivileged kids. The discussion focussed on creating education and youth programs and action plans aligned with B.PAC values and objectives.
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Advocacy
B.PAC Attends Stakeholder Meeting with the Home Minister and other Officials
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Ms. Revathy Ashok and Ms. Ashwini Nachappa represented B.PAC in a stakeholder consultation meeting by the Home Ministry, Govt. of Karnataka relating to the ban on live bands and discotheques and closure of bars and restaurants.
Mr. K.J. George, Home Minister, Govt. of Karnataka, Mr. Venkatesh Murthy, Mayor, BBMP, Mr. Raghavendra H Auradkar, Home Secretary, Mr. V.Umesh, Intelligence Head, Mr. L R Pachao, DG&IGP, Mr. Ajay Kumar Singh, Former DGP and Mr. Ajit J Gunjal, Retd High Court
Judge, were present during the meeting. Other key stakeholders who attended the meeting included FKCCI, Hotel, Pub and Bar Association, Lawyers’ Association, media representatives, NGO’s working in the area of women’s rights, and employee association representatives.
The Hon’ble Home Minister explained that this was a consultation meeting to get inputs from various groups on the issue and that more consultations would be held with other ministries and departments before drafting policy or making changes to the existing
laws. Representatives at the meeting appealed to the minister to review the issue comprehensively including excise law and police act, stricter enforcement and implementing security measures like installing CCTV’s.
BPAC representatives asked the ministry to consider the 24/7 nature of the Bangalore workforce that supports corporations across the globe and hence the need to keep commercial establishments open which would provide greater safety to working women.
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B.PAC Meets CEO-K, BBMP Election Officials and Volunteers to Prepare for ‘One Million New Votes’ Campaign
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Continuing the dialogue with government agencies for clean electoral rolls, B.PAC members Mr. Mohandas Pai, Ms. Revathy Ashok and Mr. P G Bhat met with CEO-K (Chief Election Officer-Karnataka) post elections to renew its request for removing duplicate entries,
restoring wrongly deleted entries and requested for a joint meeting between CMC (the software provider), BBMP, CEO and B.PAC officials. B.PAC appreciated the efforts of both the offices in increasing voter registrations and voter turnout and conducting free
and fair elections across Karnataka and Bangalore.
As you can see from the above, it has been a very busy time for all of us. B.PAC is excited with the nature of dialogue with all stakeholders and the increasing interest from citizens’ group to engage with us. During the coming weeks we hope to intensify these
conversations and translate them into concrete action plans. Stay tuned for more next month.
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© B.PAC. This Newsletter is Developed & Designed by Team B.PAC.
It is an initiative to engage with all stakeholders to ensure Good Governance for a Better Bangalore. Feedback:forban...@bpac.in
www.bpac.in
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