Bengaluru: Deputy Chief Minister D K Shivakumar on Thursday said the state government has sanctioned Rs 750 crore to address Bengaluru’s perennial pothole problem.
Taking aim at the BJP, he alleged that the party, when in power, did not even construct “a small pillar or flyover” to ease the city’s traffic woes.
"We are committed to fixing the pothole issue in Bengaluru. The chief minister has released a grant of Rs 750 crore for this purpose," Shivakumar told reporters after paying his respects to Kannada author S L Bhyrappa at Ravindra Kalakshetra.
On the BJP’s protest against potholes, he said: "It is true there are potholes in Bengaluru and we are filling them up on a war footing. We are in this state due to the misrule of the previous BJP government. The protesting leaders must understand that the Centre has not given any funds for Bengaluru’s development in spite of the city’s tax contributions.”
Traditionally, the now-dissolved Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) allocated just Rs 50 crore for pothole-filling in its budget. While the civic body spent a large chunk of a Rs 6,000-crore grant in 2022-23 on roadworks, little is known about the progress of those projects or the current state of newly asphalted roads.