Namma Bengaluru has 28 of 224 newly elected MLAs. Barring two first-time MLAs — Manjula Limbaval and CK Ramamurthy, 26 of them have already been MLAs. As many as 16 have been elected continuously for four or five terms — for at least 20 years!
Historically, Bengaluru elected roughly equal numbers of MLAs from both BJP and Congress — a pattern that stuck even in the previous election. The results confirm what we already know. Most of our Bengaluru City MLAs have mastered the art of winning elections by building trust with citizens and creating vote banks for themselves over many years. They focused their energies on addressing local civic issues and grievances; ensured welfare schemes reach beneficiaries. But they did not prioritise the reform agenda and rarely leveraged their legislative powers.
MLAs have the political power to bring systemic reforms in city governance, demand funds, and strengthen public institutions for planning and coordination. Our city is bursting at its seams. Over the last few years, there has been a healthy public discourse on what needs to be done.
Most people agree that we know what the solutions are but we lack a magic phrase —political will. Bengaluru will continue to scale new heights, if we, the citizens of Bengaluru, can convince our 28 MLAs to set aside their party affiliations, talk to each other and exert their collective political will to make our city more inclusive and sustainable.
Managing the growth Bengaluru experienced in the last two decades is a challenge for the best of politicians. Our population is thrice that of Singapore. Yet, our urban governance system has not evolved to deliver civic amenities, services and infrastructure to residents in all parts of our city.
Experts agree that Bengaluru needs a massive governance upgrade: systems, structures, institutions and resources — we have a severe shortage of staff and funds in our city corporation. Some of these will be legislative and will take time to formulate and bring to the table, but others can be done rather quickly if there is consensus.
Legislative agenda
Over a period of time, we have had many agencies that deliver various services to citizens: BESCOM, BWSSB and BMTC, and yet none of them has elected representatives. But the lack of coordination among agencies has been a bane for long.
Bengaluru needs better metropolitan governance. MLAs should ensure that both Metropolitan Planning Committee (MPC) and Bengaluru Metropolitan Land Transport Authority (BMLTA) are functional, empowered, staffed, budgeted, and respected. It is worth noting that the Congress manifesto promised several reforms in this regard. Even the BJP manifesto refers to governance reforms, which indicates there is common ground here.
Fixing traffic issues
BMTC is struggling with finances. Despite being the biggest public transport provider in the city with daily trips crossing 30 lakhs, BMTC doesn’t even have funds to procure more buses and due to a lack of driver recruitment, 600 buses are lying idle while thousands wait for buses in the evening rush hour braving the elements. We cannot fix traffic congestion without first fixing the BMTC. MLAs must work with the transport and finance ministers to make a strong case.
One of the five guarantees of the Congress party ahead of elections is to make bus travel free for women. If implemented, this will lead to an increase in women passengers but without increasing the fleet size, they are not going to be happy waiting longer for a crowded bus. Investment in public transport, particularly in the bus, is an investment in people.
It is well-known that city MLAs, across parties, put pressure on the chief minister to not hold BBMP elections, and as a result, we have had no BBMP Council or Corporators for 2.5 years — no democratically elected city government, while only officials call the shot regarding development issues.
At least now, the newly elected MLAs must now ask the chief minister to hold the elections by clearing all hurdles and restoring the democratic right of citizens to elect their representatives for local self-government. Without a Mayor, Standing Committees and 243 elected Corporators, it is not possible to address civic issues that are mounting every day. The BBMP Act 2021 was a step in the right direction regarding Zonal Councils and increased the term of the Mayor to 2.5 years, but a lot more needs to be done.
Empower ward committees
Empowering ward committees—the committees comprising a limited number of people from the ward—must be at the top of the agenda. The size of ward committees must be increased and members must be selected in a transparent manner to ensure active citizens become part of ward committees.
Over the last three years, we have seen what ward committees can do. They have made a big difference during the pandemic by going hyperlocal to identify and address problems. MLAs too will benefit from ward committees as they help bring all departments together for the speedy resolution of local issues through their bi-weekly meetings.
Fill the vacancies in BBMP
Staffing of BBMP is an area of deep concern. Nearly 50% of positions remain unfilled, which stresses engineers and health inspectors. The employee-to-citizen ratio is one of the worst in the world. MLAs must work on building the capacity of BBMP to cater to the needs of 1.5 crore citizens in the city.
Historically Bengaluru elected MLAs from both parties — but only one party can wield power at the state level which also includes Bengaluru. This, however, does not mean that the government can discriminate.
MLAs, irrespective of their parties, should exercise their rights and powers given under the Constitution in order to help the city do better. Ministers from the city should put extra effort into this. They all must work together to pursue a common political agenda that makes a visible difference to every citizen of the city.
MLAs of the city
(The author is a citizen activist and a Fellow at WRI India. Opinions expressed are personal)
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