'S M Krishna envisioned Bangalore to be like Singapore'

Jawaharlal Nehru in 1962 said that Bengaluru more than any other Indian city reminds him of the future.

S M Krishna during his tenure as chief minister (1999-2004) did more than any other state leader to showcase the possibility of what Bangalore (as it was then called) could become.

It was an era akin to Camelot, when world leaders chose to make Bangalore their first port of call before heading to Delhi for government meetings.

My first ever interaction with a politician was Krishna, thanks to an invitation to be part of the Bangalore Agenda Task Force (BATF) and I was taken in by his love to make Bangalore a more livable city and his leadership style which was characterised by taking all stakeholders along in realising his vision.

And what a vision it was – he said Bangalore is like Singapore, for which he was mocked, but leaders lead by choosing a goal that seems unattainable.

Krishna was willing to gamble on an experiment like BATF where folks outside the government worked closely with it for four years.

It was a collaborative, cross-pollination move that yielded results like BDA’s execution of the outer ring road, multiple flyovers including the now stressed out Hebbal road overbridge, rejuvenating Lalbagh, BBMP’s self-assessment scheme for property tax, Swachha Bangalore, Nirmala toilets, the one-way traffic initiative, sharing half the fine collections with the traffic police which made B-TRAC possible and much more.

It helped Nandan Nilekani as BATF chairman get a bird’s eye view of how change was possible within the government system.

Krishna was very hands-on about the development activities in Bangalore. He took quarterly reviews across departments and his half yearly BATF summits became the template for setting out expectations and driving inter-agency coordination.

He was a city-bred politician who got the aspiration of city residents across the spectrum and worked to realise what was possible.

A BATF-like initiative happened only during his time as CM – not before and never after and the city is poorer for it.

Krishna came across as a man of the world, an urbane personality comfortable with world and corporate leaders and pleasant with ordinary people. He was gracious when one met him near his favourite tennis court.

As Bengaluru’s challenges face us, one misses Krishna in whom the city had a champion that cared. What he did for Bengaluru will form part of his legacy. Thank you, Sir!

(The author was a member of BATF set up by S M Krishna).