JOIN USThe Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike’s (BBMP) budget for 2014-15, to be presented in the Palike Council on Monday, is expected to be “realistic”.
While the civic agency has been in the habit of presenting inflated budgets, whose only half the proposals are realised eventually, the latest estimate of revenues and expenses will be “close to reality,” sources insisted.
Dr M S Shivaprasad, chairperson of the BBMP’s Standing Committee on Taxation and Finance, said the attempt was to make the budget “as realistic as possible”. Every budget in the country is inflated and the actual implementation is just 40-45 per cent, he claimed.
Sources in the BBMP said that with the Lok Sabha elections round the corner, the focus of this year’s budget would be on social welfare. The budget would also focus on environment, health and infrastructure. They also said the BBMP would make allocations for lakes, tree plantations and parks.
What they want
Mahalaxmi Parthasarathy, director of Namma Bengaluru Foundation, said the BBMP should give priority to developing roads. “The contract (for building roads) should be awarded on a transparency basis and the details of money spent on the projects made public.”
Kathyayini Chamaraj, Executive Trustee, Civic, said: “The focus should be on setting up anganwadis using the funds allocated under the Palike SC/ST sub-plan. The money allocated under this sub-plan goes unused and carried over for many years.”
K Jayaraj, the former BBMP commissioner, said the Palike should improve public services and come up with an effective solution to disposing garbage, developing parks, among others. “Most importantly, it should make a determined attempt to increase the tax collection. At present, it collects just Rs 2,000 crore annually.”
According to Hidayath Ulla Khan, the president of HBR Layout Residents’ Welfare Association, the emphasis should be on roads and the drainage.
S Subramanya, former BBMP commissioner, said he expected the civic agency to change the property structure and focus on garbage, and bad roads. “But it does not have enough resources.”