JOIN USMayor B N Manjunatha Reddy took BBMP officials to task for their inaction over the optical fibre cables laid illegally in the City.
At the Council meeting on Saturday, he directed the officials to declare these cables as BBMP property and take them into the Palike’s custody. He asked S Somashekhar, the chief engineer of Palike’s OFC division, to show him the locations where the 1,200-km-long illegally laid OFCs had been removed.
Somashekhar said the division oversees OFC-related works, but the main job has to be performed by the ward-level engineers. He said that so far, BBMP had served notices for recovery of Rs 3.37 crore from telecom companies. Angered by the reply, the Mayor directed the Commissioner to transfer the chief engineer as he had failed in his duty. The Mayor said that if an ordinary citizen digs a road, BBMP officials impose hefty penalty on them, but they shield the telecom operators when they dig up several kilometres of road.
Floor leader R S Sathyanarayana said he had definite information that 65,000-km-long cables had been laid in the City, from which the BBMP could generate a revenue of Rs 800 crore.
Opposition leader Padmanabha Reddy said there was a nexus between the BBMP officials and the telecom firms, leading to huge revenue loss for the Palike.